Heart of Fire, Soul of Calamity

by Grand Phoenix

Naruto had always been fascinated by the tale of the Lord of Calamity, but he had never known she was still alive until the night he called upon her aid with the jutsu in the Scroll of Seals. How will this affect his dream of becoming Hokage? What new purpose will Velvet find, where sins are neither forgotten nor forgiven so easily? [AU w/some canon divergence][No pairings][OCs]

2. Rebirth of Calamity: Part Two

Notes1: Thank you for all the reviews, favorites, and follows for this story. I was reluctant at first to post this story because of not only the job keeping me busy, but also my tendencies to procrastinate tend to distract me from other tasks I could be doing. Regardless, you should expect infrequent updates because this chapter was also written ahead of time a couple weeks back, hence the quick update. It was meant to be part of the first chapter, but as you can see by the word count it has gotten quite big and had to be made into its own. Even then, I was tempted to split this one, but sudden transitions were never my thing and so I kept this as it is for the sake of the story.
Notes2: To my reviewers that want romance: Please refer to the notes in the previous chapter. I'm sorry, but it's not happening. The "no pairings" tag in the summary is there for a reason, and I will keep pointing to these notes should someone question it. I will only say it this one last time.
Notes3: OCs inbound! I know most people don't like them (and for good reason, I'll wager). I happened to grew fond of the ones I made, and while I haven't planned that far ahead (but only in bits and pieces, nothing whole), I would like to have these fellow show up now and again in the near future.
Notes4: On a lighter note, I will say the best part of writing this chapter is at the end. I credit the Kickstarter trailer for the upcoming action/horror game Blasphemous for giving me inspiration into detailing the brutality of action sequences.

---

2.
Rebirth of Calamity: Part Two

Sarutobi Hiruzen, Third Hokage of Konoha, padded down the hall of the residence he had called home for the past forty-six years.

The period from which he had been suddenly handed the mantle from his predecessor, Lord Senju Tobirama, was a chaotic time, when the Elemental Nations were dealing blow after blow to their neighbor and it seemed as though the fighting would never stop until everyone on the continent, soldier and civilian, was dead. It had been a long, hard road since then, and this house knew it well, from the insulation in the walls to the foundation beneath the floor. It had known the harried succession into office upon the return of that ill-fated mission where Lord Second gave his life to protect the squad Hiruzen had been part of, listened in on the conversations he had with the three children who would grow to become the Legendary Ninja, bore witnessed to the intimacy he shared with Biwako and the comings and goings of their own brood filling into their bodies and taking their leave to strike their own path. It became an old friend and his worst enemy, overseeing every minor and major mental obstacle that came packaged with securing and allocating funds for personal projects, assigning ninja to missions that threatened the Village's security, and—the greatest, weightiest sin of all—sign the document that would formally announce the declaration of war.

Yes, this old house had seen a lot. There were instances of love and hate for it, and in the twilight of his years he had come to make peace with himself and the necessary evils that sometimes required and even forced him to either stay his hand or play it. A house was a house, of course; it had retained the histories of the men who had come before him, it was the keeper of his history today, and it would do the same for those who would come after him when his body was given unto the earth and only the dust of his bones remained to flourish in the shadows of Konoha's roots.

Tonight, this old house would play host to a gamble.

He had watched Iruka give chase after Mizuki, and after the young man had rounded the corner he waited a moment, contenting himself to glancing surreptitiously at the broken glass glittering in the glow of the lamp from its place in his bedroom. Then he had moved on between gazing at the stars and catching snatches of the police out of his eye, and that was when he had sensed the chief of police, a broad-shouldered, dark-haired man named Takuma, approaching him from behind. "Chief Tekkou," he said. "Was anything else taken from the premises?"

"No, sir. Only the Scroll of Seals is missing. Some of your stuff has been moved around, but we don't have reason to believe Uzumaki pilfered any other valuables and materials."

Hiruzen hummed.

"However," Takuma added, and he paused upon seeing the Hokage's eyes light up. He tried not to fidget. "We've noticed the air quality in parts of the house where Uzumaki broke into and traveled appeared to have gotten somewhat," he reached for a word, "polluted." He fell silent.

Hiruzen straightened up. "Go on."

"It's nothing serious; we managed to get a reading on the levels and deemed them acceptable and safe to go back inside. The vapors should taper off within the hour. Although," and he stopped again.

"Although?" Hiruzen hazarded gently.

Takuma cast swift, minute glances to his left and to his right; the men were going about their work, removing the yellow tape blocking off the entrance to the house. Others were speaking to one or two ninja who had heard the commotion and, judging from how relaxed both parties were, persuaded them that everything was all right, Lord Hokage was not in any danger, they have everything under control but the chunin were welcome to search for Uzumaki Naruto and keep a lookout for him. This pair retreated into the dark, away from the house and into the Village. He stepped closer and leaned in. "There's something…foul…about that malevolence, Lord Hokage," he said in a hushed tone. "It felt…cold. Hateful. It wasn't a strong feeling, but some of my men were forced to fall back the closer we got to your bedroom. They said it reminded them of"—now he really did fidget—"of the Lord of Calamity."

Hiruzen chewed on the inside of his cheek, turning it over. "Which one?"

"The first one, Lord Hokage. The True Lord of Calamity."

He nodded understanding, drawings his hands away from the folds of his sleeves to clasp them behind his back. "Interesting. What else?"

"Other than the walls sustaining some warping on the surface, but there's nothing that indicates the damage goes deeper than that." He blew a stream of breath from between his cheeks. "A shame we couldn't compile any of the evidence."

"At this point, the evidence doesn't matter anymore," said Hiruzen. "All that matters is that we capture Naruto and secure the Scroll of Seals. Both in one piece, I should say," he added with blunt emphasis, and leveled an eye at the officers. Half of them had gone with the patrol and split off in two separate groups while the rest stayed behind to wrap up business at the residence. These ninja were now turned away, facing the Village; some of them were idly fingering the weapon pouches cinched to their belts. "Chief Tekkou, I have a mission for you."

"Sir?" The police chief stood to attention at the authority in his voice.

Hiruzen beckoned him even closer. When he did, he bent to his ear. "Gather your men together. Take these." He bit his thumb, reached inside his robe, and pressed it against the paper seal he had strapped to his chest. He caught the scrolls and showed them to Takuma. On both of them was the kanji for suppression. "One for yourself, and another to a person you trust and can guarantee won't hellionize."

"Lord Hokage, do you really think—"

"Yes, I do think so, and I'd rather it'd be you who does this. As much as I would like to be out there with you, I must stay here and monitor the Village for any signs of Naruto lest I, too, succumb to the madness. If anyone should undergo hellionization, I would prefer to have them be curbed and quarantined before they get out of control. We cannot have malevolence spreading before it starts; the standard issued ofuda will not be enough, hence why I am giving you these scrolls."

Takuma glanced down at them, rolling one in the cusp of his palm. "You mean these aren't meant to purify malevolence in people? I thought I had heard rumors of ofuda that could cleanse humans and beast summons being in production."

Hiruzen shook his head sadly. "No, Chief Tekkou, I'm afraid that while they are being made those kinds of seals have not been perfected. I'm certain you are aware of the high failure rate they have yielded while being used on the field. These scrolls were crafted by the Anti-Malevolence Department and will only serve to bind the target in place. You'll only have a few seconds at best to neutralize them so the curse cannot run its course."

"I see. I, and whomever I choose to bear the scroll, will only use them should the situation call for it." He clipped one to his flak jacket and held the other tight in his fist.

"Yes, you do that. Also," and he lowered his voice, "if they should hellionize completely…you know what to do."

A dark cloud settled in his furrowed brow and set his jaw in a vice, but it had come and gone as a swift, passing storm. Tekkou Takuma steeled himself and bowed low. "I understand, Lord Hokage. Your will be done."

"I will repay you in short time, regardless of the potential implications. Let your men know to tune in to my frequency on the radio in case I am able to locate and pinpoint Naruto's location. Make haste!"

That had been a few minutes ago. The house was quiet now, steeped in a thick yet fragile silence. Hiruzen sidestepped the shards of kunai (or shuriken) and security camera, remembering to sweep them up when the commotion subsided. He dragged a hand across a warped indentation of the wall as he walked by, noticing the way they rose and fell like a plain of rolling hills until the panels finally leveled out. A tiny plume of black-brown smoke, akin to some crude oil, flexed and coiled about his fingertips and into the air before dissipating. He could almost taste the anger, the scorn, flashing through his mind.

The ghost of memories and buried misanthropy. Once again, the sensation of failure and tardiness weighed upon his shoulders.

That, too, passed, just as the opportunity for redemption passed a long time ago. He knew what needed to be done. It was simply a matter of when, not if.

As he turned to enter his bedroom, the shadows adjutant to the end of the corridor shifted, spilled away, and came into the meager light, revealing the form of a man: tall, almost gangly, lean of muscle, with short brown hair spiking up on the back of his head. He wore the grey chassis and form-fitting black uniform signifying his station of an ANBU operative. The plain, caricatural black bear mask was bent to the floor as he collapsed smoothly onto one knee. "Lord Hokage," he said, and waited.

Hiruzen nodded. "Speak, Kuroguma."

"I bring you fresh tidings on Operation Stormchaser. They are…related to the current predicament."

He arched an eyebrow. "Oh? Do tell."

Kuroguma did.

The weight lessened but did not fall entirely off. "Yes…I had my suspicions, but I did not wish to act upon them with due negligence. That was why I had the Scroll in here and not locked away as per protocol. What else?"

Kuroguma continued.

He clenched his teeth, biting back frustration. "That long ago…and they've been waiting this whole time." Not just for the opportunity to obtain the Scroll, but to also… He could feel the beginnings of a triphammer headache rising from the depths of his thoughts like some underwater creature.

Kuroguma nodded. "What are your orders, sir?"

He considered his options, mind racing…and realized there weren't any other than the one he hoped to never fall back on. He couldn't, not with how much more dangerous the situation had just become and how unpredictable the results would be. What he did know, if he should pursue it, would be how long it would take before word reached the other nations, how much stronger—or much more vulnerable—Konoha's defenses would become and what it would mean for the rest of the country.

Once again, he thought absurdly of this old house, and tried to tell himself this decision was for the greater good.

He knew only a sneaking dread, but there was the faint, silver lining of childlike, primal curiosity of all the variables, all the possibilities, all the hardships and determination and heartache that would come from it. He quashed it down. "Kuroguma," he said. "Go back to Point Zero and alert the Guard. I'm issuing a Code White."

Kuroguma grew still. A beat of silence, then, "Shall I send for Master Inoichi as well?"

"Do so, as quickly as you can. Have him send out the transmission to all active and off-duty ANBU to be on standby and wait for further orders throughout the Village. Once that has been done, I want you to rejoin the Guard and monitor the Point. Use only the channel frequencies and my own if you have to; otherwise, maintain radio silence. Leave nothing to chance."

"By your will, Lord Hokage," said Kuroguma, and Hiruzen feigned turning to enter the bedroom when he added, "I pray all goes well and does not go in the direction we fear it will. It would give Lord Danzo one more reason to oppose you."

Hiruzen let the ghost of a frown show. "I have seen the things he claims are so unnecessary and wasteful, Kuroguma. All Hokage have, and while he makes a point that emotions may be a hindrance in certain aspects, he forgets that they are the foundation of human nature. It is what separates us from the monsters, but we must use our discretion as we see fit; always remember that. Now make haste."

"Yes, sir," and Kuroguma slipped back into the shadows, where a slight breeze and the scent of pine leaves signaled his departure.

Hiruzen stared at the spot the ANBU had occupied, then made his way inside the bedroom. The square light switch made a solid thunk! as he flipped it up, and blessed electricity threw everything into focus. His bed was on his left against the wall and low to the ground. Across from it by the window were his dresser and cupboards filled to the brim with scrolls of various sizes, taking up not only that particular wall but also the wall he glided past—floating shelves, bookshelves, four-to-eight cube cases with sliding doors. One of them, a tall cabinet made from cedar wood, had both doors pried open, and a few scrolls were lying on the floor every which way…not so much spilled as had been removed by hand, one by one. There was a big, empty space where the Scroll of Seals had been.

He went over to the table in front of the cases, pulled out the chair, and sat down. On a purple cushion a crystal ball gleamed up at him. It was one of the many baubles and souvenirs Uzumaki Mito had brought with her when she had left Uzushio to be with Lord Hashirama upon their marriage, and these were said to be used by her kinsmen to scope areas and study the oceans and its beasts from afar. They had fallen out of style many years later and then all but vanished when Uzushio fell during the height of the Second World War, yet the knowledge of the Telescope technique—the Far Sight, as Lady Mito had called it—remained, passed down from one Hokage to the other.

Tonight it would be used once again, not just for one gamble, but two.

The Telescope Jutsu had hand seals, but Hiruzen had performed it enough times in the privacy of this room that he did not need to form them. He placed his hands just above the crystal ball, barely touching it, and focused inward. Naruto and the Scroll were at the forefront of his thoughts, as were the damning variables of what would occur he had vocally dismissed in confidence that, even now, festered in veiled concern. He knew the boy's chakra pattern well, had known it since he had first taken him into his arms by the dying Lord Fourth as night gave way to day. He had to lose himself to the crystal ball, be attuned to it, and search as a hawk would for prey that familiar signature mixed with red.

So he did.

But his mind did not wander for Naruto.

Instead, he allowed it to drift on invisible rails that lead it to the outskirts of the Village, Point Zero. He went down, down the cold earth and moss-wet stone, down where the air was thick with leather and mineral oil, smoke from burning brands, and smoldering incense: jasmine and juniper and lavender and sandalwood, lemongrass and myrrh and chamomile and frankincense and many more. Above it all was the lingering, unpleasant stench of blood and decay.

He followed it, and soon came upon the dungeon—what the ANBU had taken to call the Maw of the Beast.

Through half-lidded, unfocused eyes he could see her in the recess of the wall farthest from the door, curled up in a loose, unwinding ball, hands clenched into fists where adamantine shackles dangled from her wrists and snaked along the floor where it met her ankles. The cell frothed and shimmered like the heat of a hot day in the distance, streaming with black-brown wisps; it turned the massive seal, shaped as the kanji for release, into a black, malformed ghost shifting in and out of reality.

The Lord of Calamity slept, unaware of the passage of time.

It frightened him how young she looked and how time no longer held any sway on a hellion, and what a ridiculous thing it was for him to think that. If anything, it brought back memories of the days after the First World War, when Mito had come in and managed to get him out of the office, telling him that as Hokage there was one more thing he had to bear. One more thing to be mindful about among many others that always had to take precedence; and so she led him there, into that secret hollow swarming with ANBU basking in the shroud of malevolence.

All the tall tales and stories he had heard in his boyhood and haunted his dreams as the wolf-headed, blood-flecked specter amounted to a baby-faced young woman not much younger than he.

Can you tell what's going on? Hiruzen asked her. Can you sense your young ward? If you can, would you please tell me so that I may get him back to safety?

The Lord of Calamity did not answer.

Hiruzen sighed, and slowly reemerged from the fog of projection back to his residence. He blinked rapidly and settled back in his chair, waiting for the feeling of displacement that sometimes accompanied the lack of Far Sight usage to pass. When he regained his bearings, he sat up and placed his hands over the crystal ball once more.

He was just going to have to do this on his own. To wait and see if his first gamble would paid off…and if he would not have to force his hand on the other.

And so this old house continued to watch and harvest his secrets, as it always did.

---

"I got in touch with the others," Iruka's tin voice came through on the radio. "We're en route to the forest. What's the status on your end?"

Mizuki landed on the roof of a building and suppressed the button on his piece. "I got them to come around. They're such a stubborn lot, thinking he's still in town. Kid's not gonna want to dawdle and get caught in public."

"You haven't had problems with them? No signs of hellionizations?"

"We're good so far. Had some more officers convene on my position and join in with the others. You?"

"Nah, all's the same."

"No problems with your group?"

"No. But they're angry, Mizuki. They're itching to get their hands on Naruto." A pause. "I can tell what they're thinking," he stated soberly, "but they won't dare say it in front of the police."

"They're stupid. They think they know everything, but they don't."

"I know."

"Just forget them and focus on the task at hand. Give me a moment to catch my breath and I'll meet you on the other side of the forest."

"Copy that. Don't take too long." With that, Iruka ended the transmission.

Mizuki huffed and let his arm drop to his side. He walked to the edge of the roof, breathed deep, held it, and let the air out in a slow, steady stream. Up here, stories above ground level, the air was sharp on the intake but cool and crisp on the tongue like rain. Yet there was nary a cloud in the sky; all the heavens were open and naked for the world to see, and here he stood, as though he were upon the highest point of Hokage Rock and not some random rooftop of insignificant origin.

He swept his arms up behind him and over his head in a stretch, unleashing a huge yawn. It was to be expected that the kid wouldn't be here in the residential areas, and unless he wanted to get nabbed and hauled back to Lord Hokage he wouldn't be caught dead in the administrative district. Oh, he could try and hide in the slums, maybe even the red light district, but those places would be picked clean by their healthier, more lucrative brethren in their vain attempts to protect him. He was still a child even if by law he would have come into adulthood upon graduating the Academy exam; no person would think to touch someone already tainted. That left the forest…or the countryside, and Naruto had never set foot outside of Konoha.

As he was working the kinks from his muscles, a slight change came over his face. His hip had grown warm, prompting him to look down at the scroll casing strapped to his thigh. He undid it, retrieved a scroll, and unfurled it. His eyes scanned the writing.

Mizuki smirked. As if he didn't know already.

He formed the Tiger seal with the thumbs on both hands just barely touching his palmed fingers around the scroll, then pushed those hands together until they met in a quiet crackling of fire. He dusted them off, spilling ash and soot in a fine, showery mist, and took off his radio earpiece. He stared it for a moment.

And crushed it.

When he opened his hand, a whisper of unnatural smoke arose from the dust and blew away from his fingertips. Then he leaped from the roof and pressed deeper into the Village, his focus now entirely on his mission…and his fulfillment.

---

Iruka sighed and let go of the button, eliciting a brief burst of static from the wireless radio. He looked up to see Antotsu, one of Chief Tekkou's men, regard him with a patient intensity that left him feeling ill at ease. If he should say or do the wrong thing, he thought, then the man in the metal visor will surely snap and correct him, with words or with fists. "Mizuki met up with the rest of the officers. He'll meet us at the rendezvous point shortly." He resisted the urge to shuffle his feet and anticipated the outburst that would follow.

Antotsu did not break into violent emotion. He simply huffed and scratched a spot behind his ear. "I really hope that kid's there and not miles away by now."

"Bah, he's just one kid! Not even a genin at that!" Mendeki, a lower-level chunin, groused, and spat tobacco over the side of the guard railing. "How much ground you think he's gonna cover with that thing on him?"

"You'd be surprised," Iruka tacked on, and remembered all the times Naruto had outran and outsmarted chunin drenched in paint, tarred and feathered, and reeking of a menagerie of scents while also being chased by hungry animals.

"Kid might not be pulling pranks anymore, but that don't mean he's changed!" said Jura, a mountain of a man with his hands stuffed into his pants pockets. "Ain't he the only one in your class who didn't pass the exams?"

"Well, er…yes."

"Then why all the concern? Mendeki's right; he ain't gonna get away if Konoha's got the whole police force on his ass from every possible angle. Some of us aren't as simple as you Academy folk."

"Hey, hey, who ya callin' 'simple'?" Mendeki growled. "Some o' us simple folk happen to get called into service, too, ya know! Our hands get just as dirty as yours! So do yours, right, teach? You did missions."

Iruka nodded grimly. "Yeah. I have. Twelve of them A-rank."

"See! Even he's got blood on him, so you tell me how he and I and the rest of us here"—Mendeki gestured grandiosely at the assembly of officers and chunin—"are simple! We're nothin' like those ignoramuses that yak and yak and yak in the bars and hops all day, claiming they can't 'get sick' or 'go mad' from the daemonblight because we have walls around the Village!"

"They're 'ignoramuses' because they haven't put their families through the Academy to see what it's really like," Sakana pointed out, a short woman with bandaged forearms and tonfa crisscrossed over her hips, "and when they do, half the time they pull their kids out of there, into the safety of their homes." She shrugged nonchalantly. "They forget that outbreaks have happened here, within these very walls."

"But only because they fling the excuse that 'they're ninja and we're not'!" Mendeki glowered, ending the last part of his sentence in a smarmy falsetto. "What a crock of bullshit!"

"The world's not a safe place."

"Gee, ya think?!"

"The world hasn't been a safe place in sixty years and will stay that way for countless more," said Antotsu. "So long as we do our job and keep our emotions in check, we will be the ones—not the civilians, not the merchants, the clerics, and the politicians—that will fall to malevolence."

"And the civilians outside the wall?" Jura asked sardonically. "What about them?"

Antotsu was silent, but everyone could see the ghost of his teeth chewing the insides of his cheeks. He did not look away from Jura's hard, narrowed gaze. Iruka could imagine the thought running through his mind, echoing what hundreds of other shinobi like him have thought between now and in the past: An unfortunate statistic.

Jura scoffed. "We'll catch 'im. Even if he does go past the gates, and I ain't saying he will, there won't be any unnecessary sacrifices, and if there will be…well," he shrugged, "that's on them. We're just doing our jobs."

"You make it sound as though Naruto's a carrier of malevolence," said Sakana.

"With all the people he's pissed off over the years, he may as well be! How do we know he's not already hellionized?"

"We would know if he was, and he's not," Iruka said defensively. "All shinobi can detect the change on some level. Maybe not as clearly as Lord Third or the Hokage before him, but we can nonetheless."

"Wouldn't surprise me, among other things," Mendeki mumbled, and scowled at the warning glare Antotsu directed at him.

Of course, Iruka thought, there was always that, the unspoken accusation that was also at the forefront every time Naruto (or, at least, the very mention of him) was involved: that the Fox had done something to him on the night of his birth and made him into the very boogeyman people feared, an offspring of both demon and hellion, and they were none the wiser to tell the difference. They could do nothing to him lest they sought to earn their Hokage's ire, so the best—and safest—alternative was to either ignore him or, when he had his back turned and was well out of earshot, mock him and wish upon him cruel things.

He tried not to dwell on them. "So can you sense it, Jura? Can you sense that we're infected? If so, then you had better look me dead in the eye and tell me we're all hellions, otherwise—!"

"Otherwise, you'd all be dead," Jura said ominously, and stopped short of touching his chest. He loomed above Iruka a good two feet, his shadow falling long and engulfing him its entirety. "I ain't ever heard o' any hellionized ninja who's retained his will."

"There's always a first!"

"And there's always a last, boyo! Do you know why? Because any ninja that hellionizes dies! Don't matter if it's on or off the field, they die all the same: with a sword through their bloody hearts! That's what we'll do to the kid if he's hellionized—grab the Scroll, pin him down, and skewer him raw—"

"I won't let you!" Iruka cried, and drew a kunai forth from inside his sleeve. Jura reached for the katana at his side, unlocking it from its sheathe with a fire-shot click.

"That's enough, both of you!" Antotsu stepped in between them and pushed them aside, hands glowing with blue chakra. "Reign in your emotions and look to reason! We are here to neutralize, not eliminate! If Naruto should hellionize, we will do whatever we can to contain him and deliver him to Lord Hokage with the Scroll of Seals intact. No one is going to hellionize. We will not allow it." The officers had hung back, scoping the surrounding area at different points on the roof, and at the sound of his emphasis they turned as one and regarded the chunin with a kind of parental foreboding. "Set your grievances aside for another time. We have our orders. Let's see to it that we uphold them." He moved away, telling his men they were leaving and to be on the alert.

Iruka and Jura exchanged stern glances. Mendeki and Sakana watched them, waiting to see what would happen next.

Jura huffed and locked the blade back into place. Iruka did the same with his kunai. "I make no apology, sensei," he said in a civil tone. "We are ninja; we know what must be done."

"Naruto's important," said Iruka. "You realize what'll happen if we kill him, right?"

"At least the Fox will go with him," Jura said quietly. "Then it will be a necessary sacrifice." He walked past him before Iruka could refute him. He was beside himself, torn between wanting to voice it and keeping it to himself. In the end, he sighed explosively and ran to catch up to him.

Sakana frowned. "What a mess this is."

Mendeki sighed and pushed up on his elbows to stand on his feet. "Tell me about it. All over a kid, too. 'S not like he's gonna be a problem. What the hell do they think is gonna go wrong?"

"Plenty of it if we're not careful," she added, and said nothing of the way the man scoffed at the very nation.

"We'll be fine," he said, and no more.

---

All around him he could hear labored breathing amplified a hundredfold. In his nostrils: the stench of sweat, body odor, and then clean air as the clones dispersed in large numbers between very brief pauses. He stayed where he was, back to the tree, head down between his knees as he came down from the adrenal high. As the Scroll dictated, the chakra did not return to him, and he could feel more than sense the weariness settling deep into the coils past his bones and between his muscles.

That was fine, Naruto decided, bearing his teeth in an open-mouthed grin. The chakra would return in time, and when it did he would finally show Masters Iruka and Mizuki the Shadow Clone Jutsu and its multiplied variation he learned—and perfected!—from this very same Scroll. Maybe it was dangerous if he didn't manage his chakra properly, and maybe it made him want to pitch forward and pass out until Tuesday (regardless of whether or not his genin cell was already announced and given its leader), but it was so much simpler than the regular, illusive clone jutsu. He couldn't help wondering why shadow clones weren't taught in the Academy if all it took to wreck a person's body, mind, and their chakra systems was to cast hundreds of them, as he just did.

At least…I did something right today, he thought, and gulped in the cool, sweet air. Only when the blood stopped roaring in his ears and his heartbeat returned to its steady rhythm did Naruto pick up his head and look around. The Scroll was lying right next to him on the grass, rolled back up and, after a lot of panicking and a little searching, reapplied with the wax seal. Some of the branches on the taller, wider trees had broken and fallen to the earth from where a good number of clones must have rested their weight. The substation was no longer brimming with moonlight, having since given way to a darkness that was softer, lighter, and not so oppressive. If there were eyes in the trees and in the bushes, then they were not human and hidden well away; perhaps they were not there at all.

Naruto moved the damp hair from his eyes over his goggles. Morning would be here soon. He had to find a good place to hide the Scroll of Seals where no one would think to find it

—Fat chance of that happening—

and haul out of here. Would here even make for a good hiding spot? No, because Master Mizuki was the one who suggested it, and if he knew about this place, then so did other ninja, no matter how removed from society it was. Somewhere in the residential and public districts was out of the question, and he didn't think twice to try the more…seedier areas, where the line between law and chaos was blurred. Those bastards would probably swipe the Scroll from under him, gut him in his sleep

—Or right in front of everyone—

and do whatever their greedy little hearts desired: put in on the black market, fence it to some independent third-party, purloin all its secrets and destroy it when they were done with it.

—NO—

Naruto stared at the Scroll with dreadful awe. He could just see, as if he were standing right there, all the things that would go wrong with summoning Velvet Crowe. She would not only be very angry at the genius who decided it was a great idea to call her away from the place where she slept to do the grunt work of what she would consider a brainless monkey, but she would be hungry. Very hungry, and the whole kit-and-kaboodle would blow up in their faces. Then she would feed, and feed, and feed, and the panic and the outrage and fear would cause everyone in the red light distract to hellionize, one after the other like fire jutsu going off in tandem, and the daemonblight would spread until it consumed all of Konoha—

Naruto shivered, the spasms rippling from the walls of his stomach so fiercely he threw his free arm across it just as he bent over his upraised knees. Face scrunched in pain, he ground his teeth, unable to stop the girlish mewl from escaping him.

It was gone just as it came, but Naruto waited, waited to see if the pain returned. It did not, and he sat up gingerly, as though he was porcelain and he would crack at any moment.

No. No, the Scroll couldn't go to any of those places and it most certainly couldn't go here. Not his house, either. Where else could he go? His mind raced, trying not to bite his fingernails.

The trees beside him gave a sudden lurch. Naruto clamped his mouth down hard enough for his teeth to click, extremities shrinking and heart thundering a lunatic staccato. He made to snatch the Scroll to his chest like a child with too many schoolbooks at hand, get up, and tear out of there faster than that crazy guy in the green spandex did running laps around Konoha, and he was shocked he could actually move his arms, that he could even move at all, and when he did get the Scroll in his grip and he scrambled to his feet the person stepped out of the cover and he was too late, oh shit was he in so much trouble—

"Naruto, it's me!" said the man, and Naruto looked upon him as though seeing him for the first time.

He broke out laughing. "Master Mizuki!" he exclaimed, breathless, grinning, coming back down to earth.

Mizuki smiled, sheepish. "Hey. Sorry I startled you. I wanted to see if you were still here."

"I've been here all night training, just like you said!" Naruto said, and tried not to wince as he thumped his chest. "Uh…no one else knows about this place, right? Just us?"

"No, just us…but they know the Scroll's missing, and if they're smart they'll comb every inch of Konoha until they do wind up here. But not to worry; I know of a few spots I've made my own we can go to."

"But what if they catch us? What about you? You're risking your whole career over me! I didn't pass, so why—"

"Because I'd like to see my students succeed," said Mizuki, "but most of all, I want to see how far they can go with the knowledge that might be in there. I'm sure you've already seen how much power has been compiled over the years, just waiting to be released…to be brought back into the world! But I think at your age, perhaps it might be too soon for you to be doing that kind of thing."

"I will when I'm older, right, Master Mizuki?" Naruto asked.

His smile broadened. "If you stay on the path, then you will. You have potential, after all, and it's a shame Master Iruka didn't see that."

"I wanna show him, Master! I wanna show him the new technique I've learned! I mean, I only memorized one and it took a couple hours to get it down just right, and you're really fast, too, so that's all I could take away from it. It's the Shadow Clone Jutsu, and the last jutsu you had to show off in the exam was the Clone Jutsu. That's gotta mean something, right? He'll let me graduate for sure!"

Mizuki nodded. "Mmhmm."

"Some of these techniques…Master Mizuki, they're amazing, y'know? They're like the stuff of legends! Like…like…all those stories I used to read about in the library! The old Hokage and the, uh, what's his name, the White Fang, the Legendary Three Ninja, and even the samurai from the Land of Iron…I'm going to be just like them someday! Wait, no, scratch that—not just like them. I'm going to surpass them all!"

Mizuki pressed his lips together, but one corner of his mouth was quirked high up to show dimples. "Yeah…I know you will. But Naruto, most of that knowledge is meaningless if you can't make heads or tails of it." He held out a hand. "I can show you how to harness that power and make it your own. The world is more dangerous than it's ever been before, and if you intend to become the greatest Hokage that's ever lived, you'll have to know how to take advantage of the playing field. You have to understand that where there are hellions, there are Lords of Calamity. You remember what those are, right?"

Naruto nodded vigorously. "Yeah! They're people that can generate a ton of malevolence and look like animals but haven't gone crazy from it."

"Good. Then you know that where there are Lords, there are Kage that have to keep two steps ahead of them. They have to maintain the status quo so that all the power is in their hands, never in those who are too weak to control it or too obsessed to use it wisely. If they can't hold onto that power, then the Lord will gather his or her army and invade their country to conquer and add it to their domain. "

Naruto scratched the underside of his chin, mulling it over. "But…how can a Kage defeat a Lord of Calamity without sealing them away? Just because you beat them doesn't mean the land turns back to normal. The daemonblight's still there…there's no cure for it."

"Ah-ah-ah!" Mizuki tut-tutted, waving a scholarly finger. "There isn't a long-term solution, you mean! Everything you've learned at the Academy about agricultural purification just means we're one step closer to return the affected lands to what they once were. Trade routes will be reestablished and businesses will thrive over the bones of those that did not survive."

"Then…what about all the people?"

Mizuki frowned. "What about them?"

"Well…they're still infected. How do you change them back to humans? Hellions don't just, you know, come out of thin air." Naruto swept his arms aside, indicating the forest. "The Lord makes them that way, and if you get rid of a Lord, the people are still hellions, and if you kill those hellions, more people will become hellions. It'd never stop, so you'd have to, uh, lock them up until you find a cure, and that'd take a long, long time! So how would you make a cure for them if you can't kill them on the chance that one of them will become a Lord and start the whole thing all over again?"

The Master's face darkened, as though a cloud had come over it. Naruto didn't like the way it made him look, so he was barely aware of his grip tightening protectively around the Scroll. "You'd be surprised. People are very malleable, meaning they can easily adapt and change depending on the circumstances. Hellionization does that…but sometimes, Naruto, sometimes a person can still retain his will. Most of the time, though? Most of the time they become…different than from how they were as a human. They may forsake the laws and order they had followed in the past and embrace the darkness that's inside us but are too afraid to acknowledge, for they lose the warmth and coldness in their bodies. They may find only joy and solace in causing fights, like the yaksha hellions. They may even turn into therions and lose their sense of taste, finding only comfort and sustenance in the souls of the living and the dead." Mizuki smiled grimly. "With knowledge comes power, and with power comes consequences…but when the weak are desperate and the strong are ambitious, they'll give in and become unto gods. The longer they live, the more powerful they become…the more unstoppable they become!"

His voice had grown stronger, louder, and his face took on a pale, wide-eyed picture of a man on the cusp of discovering the most hidden, most valuable treasure in the world. It was a fell light revealing a depravity that stunned Naruto and left him breathless, as though he had been socked in the stomach.

This wasn't the kind, brotherly Master Mizuki he had admired in school. It couldn't be! This was a man wearing Master Mizuki's face, it just had to be!

—It isn't—

Naruto let go of the Scroll and with shaking hands tried to form the seals for release.

Mizuki regarded him curiously. "Naruto…what are you doing?"

"You're pulling my leg, aren't you, Master? You're just trying to scare me straight so I don't mess up, right? I-I bet all the teachers do that to their students, too, eh?"

Mizuki looked at him with the facsimile of pity. "Oh, Naruto, this is real. Everything I've told you is true, and wishing it wasn't won't do you any good. Life's a bitch, and so are the people that never told you the honest, goddamned truths."

"Like what?!"

"Why, that hellions walk among you…even now," said Mizuki, and with those words streamers of energy the color of mud leaked from the soles of his feet to the crown of his head. Naruto lunged backward into the tree, fumbled the Scroll and caught it before it hit the ground. The air took on a shimmering sheen, and when he exhaled he paused at the sight of the cloud his breath made.

—Look—

—Look and see—

Naruto looked up, and his mouth fell open. In place of the man with silver hair and pink skin was a tiger on two long, digitigrade legs with paws that were bigger than his head and nails like black kunai. He was hunchbacked, the tattered remains of his flak jacket hanging off a massive barrel-shaped chest slashed with dark stripes and spots. Four large spikes protruded from his back like the teeth of an ancient leviathan, gunmetal grey and perfect isosceles angles.

His stomach rolled queasily. Those weren't spikes. They were giant shuriken melded into his back. "No…No way!" he gasped.

Mizuki grinned from a feline muzzle stuffed full of sharp teeth. "Oh, it's real, alright," he said in a voice lower and more guttural than before. "This is what they don't teach you at the Academy, Naruto. This is what we can do if we just give in…what you can do, as well! All the power at your disposal, right here in Konoha, all because of Lord Velvet! You are better than you think you are, Naruto! No one will ever acknowledge you the way you are now, but if you will allow me I will show you the error of your ways…the Village's ways! Only then will you prove those ignorant fools wrong and show them for who you really are!"

"I know who I am!"

"No, you don't! You think you do but you don't! The people in their 'infinite wisdom' do!"

"Then who do you think I am?"

"I don't think, Uzumaki Naruto. I know for a fact you're a hellion! A hellion transcended to Lord of Calamity from the Nine-Tailed Demon Fox when it was bound and trapped inside you twelve years ago! Lord Fourth made you that way! It's because of him you were ignored and mocked and threatened! They balk and cower at the notion of a hellion wearing the sacred hat and garb of office when they believe those dreams of grandeur are but a front for conquest! And do you know why they act the way they do? The Fourth Hokage may have made you a hellion, but it was your beloved old man, the Lord Third, who signed into law the two decrees that pushed us further to damnation!"

The panic was there, but it ebbed away to a laser-focus attention Mizuki only saw when his class discussed hellions, their history, and how to counter them. He could not help but be pleased. "What decrees?" Naruto asked with a slight quaver.

Mizuki held up one long, thick, finger. "That the villagers must never speak of the Fox lest they be punished as far as Konoha law could allow it; and two," he held up another, "that the knowledge of mentally stable hellions must be withheld from all law enforcement and military personnel. Imagine, Naruto, what would happen if everyone in the Land of Fire were to learn that more than half the shinobi population, the very people that protect them from hellions and Lord-potentials, consisted of the very monsters they were sworn to vanquish?" A fat, pink tongue poked from his mouth and laved his lips with saliva. "That much discord would elevate us to heights that were once dreamed of!

"How about it, Naruto? Come with me. My master and I will give you the strength you need to be the Kage you were meant to be, by first unleashing the power that resides in the Scroll, used as an instrument of your bondage! Only then will you be feared and respected by the masses."

"But I don't want people to fear me!" cried Naruto, and he loathed the way he shrank on himself at the dispassionate look directed at him. "I do want to be Hokage! I want to be noticed and respected!"

"Then why dally here? No one likes you, not even the Hokage!"

"That's a lie! Master Iruka might be a hardass and pushes me to study, but he's a cool guy and he never told me I couldn't try and be Hokage! Same with the old man, too! His job is so hard because he always tells me how people disagree with him on certain things like politics and purifications and how it gets so bad that sometimes he has to stop someone from trying to kill him. He tells me that being Hokage means getting blood on your hands when you have no choice but to declare war in order to bring peace, even if it means the land gets screwed over even more and causes more hellions to spawn!

"But…even with all of that…he still tries, ya know," Naruto added. The weight of malevolence grew thicker, denser, and he clutched his chest as the weight of it sank into him like air being blown into a balloon. "He tries to help, even when the people say they don't need it. He tries even when they expect so much outta him that he can't really take some time off to get away from everything. That's why," he forced through gritted teeth, "I'm gonna stay here and earn it…the hard way! Maybe as a little kid I wanted to, but running away from the Village is something only a coward would do, so you can tell your boss that whatever he wants me for I'm not interested in it!"

Mizuki reared back on his hind paws, ears folding back in dismay. "So that's how you really feel, huh? After everything I told you, between what you knew then and what you know now, you would willingly condemn yourself to this existence? This…madness?!"

"Hell yeah I would!"

"Why would you do that?!"

"Because I know I have the Fox in me!" Naruto declared, and in that moment he thought he could feel the weight lift from him. He nodded matter-of-factly, moving his hand from his chest to his stomach, and the warmth of the beast's chakra emanated through the jacket like a still-smoldering ember. "I know," he said more calmly. "I've known for a long time I was his jailer."

Mizuki looked poleaxed, gawping, but he clicked his mouth shut and regained his composure. "Interesting. So then you aware of who Lord Fourth is to you, don't you?"

Naruto's stare was hard and crystal blue. "Yeah," he said.

The hellion sighed and ran a meaty paw through the tuff of silver fur on his head. "Fine then. I'll just drag you back to my master. Dead or alive, he'll find a use for you…and Lord Velvet." He took a step forward, and malevolence splashed with explosive force.

Naruto issued a low-pitched keen and scrambled to get up. He formed the Tiger hand seal.

Idiot! Conserve your chakra! You can't fight him as you are! You need to run!

Naruto ignored the Fox. "Shadow Clone Jutsu!" he called. Two dozen clones, fully fleshed-and-blooded, appeared in a ring around Mizuki. They rolled up their sleeves, clenched their fists, and with battle cries charged at him.

Mizuki brayed laughter. "That's it? Is that all you can muster?" He raised his clawed hands above his head and brought them crashing to the ground. A shockwave of purple flame bubbled outward and pierced through the column of clones like a sawblade, causing them to dissipate. "Come on! I thought you said wanted to be Hokage? You can do better than that!"

Wheezing, and finally managing to get the strap of the Scroll on his person, Naruto formed the seal again, and this time fifty clones materialized. They freed kunai and shuriken from their pouches and flung them as they ran at him.

Mizuki grinned, eyes twinkling mirth. He clapped his paws once and he spread his arms out up and over his head, creating a shield of the same purple fire that covered him on all sides. The weapons struck true…and burned away until nothing but cinders remained. The clones saw this and in their haste screeched to a halt, but their companions behind them slammed into their backs and pushed them forward to be consumed by the shield. Mizuki performed a second shockwave and the earth trembled, disposing the rest into smoke.

When he rose, he rolled his neck, eliciting several loud, crackling pops. "My turn."

Naruto slumped against the tree, staring disbelievingly. His lungs burned heat and cold. His chakra network was a barren well. His vision blurred with sweat and exhaustion. I'm gonna die, he thought. I'mgonnadie I'mgonnadie I'mgonnadie I'mgonna—

"Hm?" Mizuki's ears twitched, and he turned his head sidelong. They flickered once, twice. They drooped. The hair on the back of his neck bristled and he bared his teeth in a contemptuous snarl. "Looks like they've finally caught up."

Somewhere amidst the panic, impending doom, and the uncomfortable turning the Fox made in his navel, Naruto heard a small, clear part of him echo the word: They?

"I see him! He's over here!" shouted an excited, distant voice. Branches creaked and foliage rustled, and then a man emerged from the forest into the clearing. He was an unremarkable fellow dressed in the green and blue uniform of Konoha's ninja, the only exception being the teal, four-pointed star of the Konoha Military Police Force on his upper arms. There was a triumphant smile on his lips. "There you are, you little sneak—What in the wild fuck?"

Mizuki made the sign of the Horse, and one by one a dozen clones coalesced into being by pounding headlong into the woods, roaring not as a man but as a tiger from the darkest depths of the jungle. One appeared almost on top of the officer and grabbed him by the collar of his flak jacket as he was reaching into his weapons pouch. "BACK UP!" the man cried as he was hauled into the air. "I NEED BACK UP! WE'VE GOT A HELLION—"

He was flung back where he had come from, and there came a calamitous crash of wood snapping and surprised yelling as he met the body of an unlucky ninja. Those who had not been taken off guard landed in the clearing and on the substation's roof, weapons drawn.

From behind Naruto, another group of ninja came into view. Most ran past him as a second set of hellion clones materialized at Mizuki's back and engaged them, rendering the silence null with curses and shouts. Immediately following were clashing steel, disturbed earth, and, his nose twitching at the scent of putrescence mingled with blood.

He blinked stupidly. Where the air had bubbled around Mizuki earlier it had now engulfed the entire clearing. It was like the heat haze on the horizon had been pulled all the way to the forefront for him to see better and boil in, but this heat was wintry, the kind that lines the lungs with frost and thus make it hurt to breathe. His teeth were clenched but they rattled, his flesh swam with goosebumps and made the hairs on his arms stand on end, there was nothing in his bladder but that didn't stop his balls from sticking to his thighs, yet even though the air frothed and made the world glossy and distorted like stained glass, somehow, someway, he could see very clearly. His mind was quiet and at peace, the noise of combat resonating from a faraway dream.

—RUN—

Everything was so clear, so pristine, and he could still see the darkness: at his periphery, in the shadow of the trees and the substation, at the edges of the ninja as they ducked and weaved and shoved back against Mizuki and the clones as cardboard cutouts fighting their own inner battle for freedom. All this darkness seethed, popping as tiny, transparent bubbles that floated away and went up, up, up until they popped and drip-drip-dripped onto the ground and soaked through the grass and the dirt and evaporated into the roots of all the trees that gave Konohagakure its name and it was everywhere, it wasn't just Mizuki's malevolence but it was the officers' malevolence and the chunin's and the owls' and the night birds' and the wild animals' and the men's and women's and children's and himself. There was just so much—

RUN, YOU FOOL!

"Oh my God…Mizuki?!" Naruto gasped, startled, and saw Master Iruka standing in front of him, kunai in hand. "What in the world—"

"Holy shit…!" Antotsu hissed, and produced the scroll from his jacket.

"Hold them off!" Mizuki bellowed to those clones not yet fallen. "I'm going after him!" He made the Horse hand seal and more of the hellion shades spawned.

"Naruto, run!" Iruka roared.

"M-Master Iruka—"

"Protect that Scroll with your life!"

"But—!"

"GO!" He snatched him by the back of his collar and, putting all his weight into it, threw the boy behind him.

Naruto tripped and fell on his face, grunting as the Scroll smashed into his back. He scrabbled on hands and knees for purchase only to be picked up and all but dropped back onto his feet. "As far away as you can, boyo!" said Jura, and clasped his hand over the other around his katana. "We will hold the line!"

"We got your back, kid! Get going!" said Mendeki, and unsheathed twin, crescent-shaped sickles. Sakana kept apace at his side, summoning two doppelgangers with withdrawn, dangling tonfas.

Naruto didn't wait. He stumbled, caught himself, and ran.

---

Yamanaka Inoichi lighted atop a skylight and paused, sucking in air and listening to the blood of his racing heart drum in his ears. His limbs thrived with a fire brought on by chakra-induced adrenaline created from augmenting his physical prowess and stamina crossing the better length of Konoha to reach Intelligence Division headquarters to deliver the Hokage's orders to all available ANBU. He could sense them now, closing his eyes as he hunkered down on his haunches and pressed a finger to the glass, concentrating on the signatures that blazed faintly across town.

Malevolence trailed behind them like phantom cloaks, and in their very centers—the wicks of their hearts, his father had once described them when he was a lad—were ashes: not quite dry but still packing enough residue to reignite, slowly and quickly. Farther away, he could caress the stain blotting the blackness behind his eyelids, violent and determined; just staring at it made his heart seize up. He had a feeling as to who it was, but the Hokage had been vague about going any further with Operation Stormchaser. Wait, he had said, and Inoichi, partly against his own judgment and partly due to understanding the situation, opted to wait. That had been two weeks ago.

Inoichi opened his eyes and looked north, beyond the forest. He didn't have to sense the Lord's Guard to know they were gathered around her cell, waiting with nervous anticipation. They would have their blades out, he surmised, low to the ground but held in steady, white-laced grips. They would pace and make nary a sound, their hidden eyes never tearing away from the woman. They would sit on the bench against the walls and keep their blades on their laps or by their sides where they could easily reach them should she prove…uncooperative. But they would watch her; oh, they would watch her until the end of time if the Hokage commanded them to, and they would be like gargoyles: immovable, untouchable, eternal.

Stopping her, however….

Inoichi blew a stream of breath from between his cheeks. He had been the Lord's Minder ever since Inomaru passed away twenty years ago, before the Elemental Nations concluded that a third world war was needed to reclaim their former power and boost their dwindling economies. On his deathbed and in his will he had given Inoichi the Red Books, records containing all the notes, designs, comments, experiment logs, and memory extractions he had documented from his time he spent in the presence of Velvet Crowe. He had gone through them since then, putting down pen to paper his thoughts and theories and hypotheses of what he interpreted from his sessions with her, and when one Red Book was filled he would be provided with another by the specialists that worked in the Konoha Archive Library. He had gone to them to receive a new Book twice, taking pains to not cram the pages with needless wordings and incomplete sketches that were not important to the research the Anti-Malevolence Department could use for developing newer and better, more efficient purification seals, for the land and, more importantly, for humanity.

The few times she refused the Mind Body Transmission, he applied the issued containment jutsu sealed in the scrolls the Shrines of the Unforgotten created and distributed to upper-level field agents or entrusted jounin-level ninja. Each time they failed, barely able to impound her. He had even performed the jutsu designed by the Shrines and the AMD to purify on a self-contained scale when the Lord exuded too much malevolence. Each time they were burned away by the seraphic fire in her left arm, and though he was still uncertain to this day if his needling convinced her, she would stuff the blight back into her, reshape that demonic claw to something more human, and, albeit disapproving and unimpressed, relented and gave him passage to do as he—no, the Hokage—was expected to do.

Strange, he thought. In spite of all the grumbling and fatalistic philosophizing, Velvet Crowe never once instigated a fight with the Guard. There were…instances where one or two of them took matters into their own hands and carry out the execution Lord First had 'failed' to uphold. Those failed, too, and he had the pleasure of seeing one happen firsthand.

Inoichi walked to the lip of the skylight and stopped. Wait, the Hokage had commanded after he relayed to him the transmissions had been sent. They could still deal with the turncoat. The forest would have to be quarantined and those inflicted by the blight under heavy observation until they were deemed safe to coexist with humanity, but they needn't kill the man. If they could incapacitate him, they could bring him back for questioning…and when they had all the information and confirmed it to be true, only then would they eliminate him. The Scroll would be back in protective custody and his master deprived of another indoctrinated agent and test subject.

But Mizuki had gotten the boy involved—Uzumaki Naruto, the Fox's Guardian (and how odd it sounded! that the beast who had the power to cause disasters and went down in history as a Lordly boogeyman had to be guarded) and the Lord's Keeper, and the opportunity for capture and interrogation was swiftly drawing to a close. He had the Scroll, he had read the forbidden spell, and in their private meetings Lord Third had always made mention how interested he was in hellions and malevolence and the tale of the Spring of Devastation. How that and his predecessors' works were the only things that kept him on track to his seemingly impossible dream.

Maybe he won't do it, Inoichi thought. He's a smart kid. He should know from the stories how she is. We can get Mizuki.

The more he tried, the more he was convinced it was useless to hold onto false comfort.

A little more confidently: Maybe it won't be so bad. Lady Mito reined her in. So did Kushina.

But Naruto was neither Lady Mito nor his mother. He was simply a boy on the precipice of adulthood, tasked with the burden of protecting the Fox from the scourge of malevolence and so much more.

We'll find a way. We have to. We can do this.

Inoichi gulped air, concentrated chakra into his feet, and bounded off the building.

---

Tekkou Takuma flew through the air as another shockwave ran through the ranks. He gathered his chakra and flipped around so that when he fell he was on all fours, grabbing for purchase as his feet dug furrows in the ground. Coming to a full stop, he looked up and saw a hellion clone come right at him, laughing and swinging those razor-tipped claws. He rose on shaking legs and struck his blade against a descending paw. His knees buckled but he did not fall. Takuma pushed back, locked in a stalemate that bent his back with the force the clone put into its arms and the pressure growing colder and harder in his chest. He could hear the earth caving in. The taste of rot seeped into his mouth. The clone laughed and pushed again.

"Fire Release: Great Fireball Jutsu!" A spiraling gout of flame raced across the field and swallowed the hellion whole, scorching grass in its wake. Takuma collapsed and caught himself with one hand and used the other to stand up with the other on the sword's pommel.

Antotsu helped him get there the rest of the way. "Are you alright, Chief Tekkou?"

He nodded, panting. "Y-Yes, lieutenant. Thank you."

"We need to find a way to break through these clones and get to the real Mizuki, sir."

"I know. Do you still have the scroll I gave you?"

"Yes, sir!"

"Get it out," he said, and reached into his flak jacket to retrieve it.

A pained, angry cry punctuated his words, compelling Antotsu to spin around. A ninja—one from Chief Tekkou's group—had dropped to his knees and doubled over, clutching his head. Malevolence exuded from his body like steam. "S-Seiji!"

"It's all his fault…!" Seiji groaned. His eyes were bloodshot and bulging amid veneers of sweat and blood. He was grinding his teeth so hard his jaw popped. "Shoulda killed the little shit when we had the chance…before the demon gets out…this wouldn't be happening…!"

Another ninja slumped against a tree, breathing hard and gaze unfocused. The spaces between her fingers bit into the sharpened edges of the shuriken and bled freely. "You fucked us over, Chief!" she snarled. "Going after…one hellion…for another…they should both die!" The more she spoke, the more guttural and animalistic she sounded, the more malevolence poured from her and changed her into something foul and twisted.

More and more shinobi fell. Some were the Chief's own:

"I don't wanna die, I don't wanna die—"

"He was never one of us—"

"Find him and kill him—!"

"It hurts, oh Sage it hurts—"

"This power…so much of it…so much of it denied—!"

"Kill the demon—"

"Kill the Lord of Calamity—"

"Find him! Find him! FIND HIM!"

Their cries turned to howls and roars of beastly rage, and one by one the malevolence overtook them in combustive bursts. When their auras receded, there were no longer ninja but hellions: broad-shouldered werewolves; weasel-men and harpy-women with barbed tails and talons; shadow-wraiths keeping their former uniforms afloat by masses of blight and black chakra; abominations more outlandish and mocking of the human form.

"Goddammit, no!" Antotsu cried, and grabbed for his scroll.

One of the Mizuki-hellion clones laughed uproariously. "I was right! I was completely, absolutely right! The hatred for the boy in your hearts is so palpable I can taste it!" He sidestepped a police officer and knocked him to the ground with an elbow between the shoulder blades. "He belongs to me now! I will take him somewhere he truly belongs!" He hunched over and blocked a flurry of kunai and shuriken with his spikes. Upon rising, he yanked one out of his back with a sickening squelch and slashed through the chest of another ninja.

A werewolf made a beeline for Antotsu and Takuma. The police chief stepped in front of his lieutenant. He bit the thumb of one hand and, as he unlocked the scroll and the parchment spilled out in rolling streamers, dashed the blood across the religious formulae. "O heavenly kami, beyond space and time, hear my plea and bind this beast of corruption!" He punched the scroll to the hellion's chest. "SEAL!" He let go.

The fluttering paper turned into chakra chains, and from the casing they latched onto the hellion and wrapped around it. A circle of chakra resembling the kanji for ensnare appeared underneath its feet and glowed, keeping it in place. The werewolf growled and bucked against the chains, muscles flexing and claws digging into the earth.

Antotsu undid his own scroll and tossed it at an assortment of hellions pushing the advantage on their fellow ninja. He, too, recited the same incantation, capping it off with a clear "SEAL!" Multiple chakra chains caught the creatures and the circles shackled them where they stood. They hissed and spat at them.

Side by side, Takuma and Antotsu made the signs and from the circle-shape of their hands blew twin fireballs at the hellions. Most were incinerated and screamed their death throes, but the others broke from their bindings just as the jutsu was upon them and leaped out of the way.

"Shit!" Takuma barely got his hand on the sword before he was floored by a slavering, grinning werewolf.

He heard Antotsu cry "CHIEF!" and a similar sound of him being pushed against a hard surface punctuated by hurtful shouts. Takuma swung his head around and gasped, saw his life flash before his eyes at the oncoming paw falling upon him like a guillotine.

The werewolf jerked upward, screeching agony, and its arm went wide, shaving metal from his forehead protector and hair off his head. It fell on top of him, pushing the breath out of his chest in a wheezing whoosh. Grunting and trying not to choke on the malevolence, Takuma heaved the woman's corpse off him and sat up. A trio of harpies had pinned Antotsu to a tree; two of them lay at his feet, their throats slashed. He watched the head of the third disappear into Jura's massive hand, be raised above him, and come crashing down as a missile of feathers and spurting blood. The man stomped on its neck twice, shattering bone, and on the third he bashed its head to a gory, grey pulp. Takuma swallowed back his gorge.

Jura took Antotsu by one shoulder and yanked him out of the indentation he had made. "Th-Thank you!" said the lieutenant.

The large man chuffed. "You got lucky, boyo! Them scrolls you had ain't gonna help you anymore than those fuckin' ofuda! Don't let yer guard down!" He grasped his katana, took up a stance, and threw himself back into the fray, bellowing a battle cry.

Antotsu looked at the bodies scattered all over the clearing with dawning horror. "I knew some of these people," he murmured. His eyes were big and shiny, his face white like curdled milk. "I've known them for years."

Takuma joined him, taking note how some of the MPF emblems were soaked in blood or shredded to the point of being unrecognizable by the transformations. Noted the horror, the pain, the frustration frozen on their faces. His heart fell.

"Is that it?" Antotsu asked, waking him from his reverie.

"Is what it?"

"This. Is this it? Is there really no other way we can save them?" He sagged, bent and appearing far older than he was. "Such a waste of life…."

Takuma nodded. "We still have our mission. Regardless of their feelings toward the boy, they were still our comrades. We'll pay our dues to the dead once we get through this."

Antotsu frowned. "You mean if we survive this."

"There's no if, lieutenant," said Tekkou Takuma with firm conviction, and freed his sword. "We will."

---

Iruka's kunai struck the clone's giant shuriken blade once more, and the shock came so suddenly it stung his arm fiercely and ran up the hill of his shoulder. He reeled back, put weight on his footing, and reared up with a horizontal swipe to the left. Steel met steel, but the beast was stronger, malevolence flooding through it like a beacon. It moved its own arm up and away, and the kunai flew from his hand and scratched past the sleeve of his shirt into his arm.

He shouted and clenched his teeth. It was as though the power lines in the distance had been severed and were sparking electricity, but it was his blood, blood spilled from an enemy—his friend! It dangled listlessly at his side and Iruka wrapped his hand around it, trying to staunch the flow that just wouldn't stop, and gazed upon the creature with a cocktail of revolt, anger, and disbelief.

"In a way, Iruka, I'm glad you didn't pass Naruto," it said, deftly twirling the shuriken blade in one paw; blood and malevolence windmilled in tiny red and black dots at his feet. "Thanks to you, you made my task so much easier. Besides, what are ninja if they can't handle a hellion who's all there in the head? Haven't you ever considered the thought? Oh…that's right." The Mizuki clone grinned. "Of course not. Quite the outdated system you have there, Master!"

How long? How long had Mizuki been this way, been corrupted into this perversion of a man he had known since childhood to be his best friend and confidante? What the hell had gone wrong, for Mizuki to think dabbling with cursed magic and give into it? And to think, he had waited all this time, just to get his hands on Naruto…

Just what did he want from him?

"GET YOUR HEAD IN THE GAME, MAN!"

Mendeki's voice was like an arrow, and it roused Iruka back to reality, back to the clone hefting the blade—no, not a blade, he realized with a sickening lurch, but the broken shard of the giant shuriken Mizuki preferred to carry around—and the Tiger hand seal clasped around its pointed end. The chunin soared through the air, forming the Snake seal, and slammed his hands to the ground. "Earth Release: Mountain Range!" he called, and several stone spikes erupted from the ground, aimed at the clone. It snarled and flung the shard at Mendeki, then lunged forward and grabbed the spear that punched through the earth right in front of it. His nails sliced into it, pushed through the rock and grappled for purchase. The sinews in its arms and legs bunched and corded, rising to the veiled wrappings of fur and skin. The spear groaned, its base cracking.

Mendeki swore and ducked, the shuriken shard sailing past him, slicing into one of Sakana's clones. She ignored it, put on speed, and planted a foot on the chunin's shoulder. He grunted but did not protest as she leaped off him like a springboard. She made several hand signs and drew an arm back. The tonfa she held blazed with chakra. "Fire Release: Meteor Strike!" she called, and the chakra exploded with fire. Sakana spiraled once in a descending corkscrew kick, her leg also encased in chakra

The rock spear snapped like a tree branch, and the Mizuki-hellion hauled it up against its chest, motioning to throw. It grunted as the woman landed, one foot on it, and pressed down on it and bearing the full weight of it on top of him. A fiery half-moon slash from the tonfa cut it in half, and the heat shattered both pieces into a hail of debris. Both chunin and hellion tumbled away from each other, the former managing to roll upright onto all fours.

"Now, teach!" she said, and one of the illusions that hadn't dissipated flung the shard in Iruka's direction. He ran, brushed off the pain in his left arm bouncing against him, and raised his right hand. He snatched it and winced as it bit into his skin, but he tightened his grip on it. Tightened it, reared his arm back, and with a cry threw it as hard as he could. He pitched forward and struck the ground with his chin, snapping his teeth together and blowing stars behind his eyes.

The hellion got to its feet and howled frustration as the shuriken sank into its chest with a meaty thunk! It hung suspended in midair for a second as the clone burst into smoke and blight, and then it kept going, whistling into the dark.

Mendeki pushed himself to his feet. "Helluva throwing arm you got there, Iruka…but you gotta focus! You're no good to us if you're dead! How'm I supposed to get those li'l monsters to pay attention in class?"

"I'm sorry," Iruka panted, and couldn't stop biting back the grunt as needles lanced up the shredded arm. "It's just…why Naruto? Why…Why did it have to be Mizuki—" he huffed and slid down the tree he backed into, blinking away sweat.

Sakana moved next to him and managed to shuffle Iruka around so that he was on the other side of the tree, in shadow and away from the fighting. "You just hang tight there and let us take care of these things," she said gently.

"But Mizuki—"

"Is a hellion, and if you go in there as you are now, you are going to die. You will not win against him or the others that have turned," she added sternly, and pushed him back down when he tried to get up. She frowned at the angered, wounded look he gave her and sighed. "I know you're worried, Master. We'll find him…and when we do, you're going to live to see him. Do you understand?"

Iruka sulked and closed his eyes. "Yeah," he whispered sleepily. "Just…be careful. I want to see him again…so I can clobber him…real good…." His words trailed off, slurring at the end.

Sakana jostled his shoulders. "Master? Master! Stay awake, Master!"

"Yo, I need a medic o'er here! Man down!" Mendeki bellowed above the din, and waved over a nearby officer who had heard him.

"I don't have much in the way of tools," he said after he assessed Iruka's wound, "but I can try to staunch the flow and keep him out of the way until this blows over where he can get more medical attention."

"That's fine, do whatever ya can! We'll hold 'em off! Come on, Kana!" He whipped out several shuriken from his pouch and clenched them between his fingers, charging into the fray. Sakana harrumphed, twirled the tonfa into her grip, and joined him.

---

The trees…the trees were watercolor, colors blurring and running together in a palette of muck and oil. That was how they looked to Naruto as he pelted deeper into the woods, heedless of his clothes snagging and tearing on branches, crushing twigs and sticks underfoot, and crashing past shrubs and nearly slamming into trees wider than he was. He didn't look back. He couldn't, wouldn't, because if he did then that thing would be galvanized to run faster, faster, until it was right on top of him and had him by the scruff of the neck to…what, take him to its master? No. No, it would eat him, suck the meat right off the bone, the soul from the brain, and leave his body for the carrion birds to pick clean—

"GOT YOU!"

Naruto's heart damn near leaped from his throat. He glanced behind him and felt all the breath go out of him as a paw swept in like a scythe. He ducked, heard the crack of his ankles twist inward and kick blindly, uselessly, as he turned on his side and fell. He hit the ground and rolled away, but his sternum burned, as if he had been branded, and his mind went white.

The trees stopped shaking and the branches stopped breaking, interceded with quiet, heavy breathing and padded footsteps. Naruto groaned, sat up, pressed a hand under his left armpit, and drew it away. It came back bloody.

"You're such a troublesome boy," Mizuki said, staring down at him from his nose, "but that's alright. The master has a knack for calming the nerves. I promise you: if you're good and don't raise a fuss, he'll give you the best treatment one could hope for. We'll take good care of the Fox, too."

Like hell he will! the Fox said. He will not have me!

Naruto managed to get up on one knee, tried to push into a standing position. The laceration flared, sending fire and lightning along his arm. He bit back a cry and collapsed. Blood dripped and dyed the grass in nonsense patterns. I…I don't have enough chakra, Kurama—

Just enough, he growled. That's all I need.

For what?

He looked up and Mizuki was five feet away and closing that distance. In that one second he was there, finishing cracking his knuckles, and when he blinked Mizuki's arm was outstretched and the shadow of his paw engulfed his head. Naruto closed his eyes, waiting for the inevitable. It never came, and he kept them closed as a starburst of chakra like heat rushed through his pressure points and out into the open, searing his vision in red-yellow radiance.

The Fox's chakra covered him like a cloak, and the topmost half shifted and shaped into a fiery interpretation of himself, teeth bared and hackles pronounced. Mizuki yelled and backpedaled away, and Naruto opened his eyes to see him flailing his burning arms. He sniffed rot, singed fur, and cooked flesh. The smell, in conjunction with the pain, almost knocked him out.

We need to summon Velvet, said the Fox.

Naruto's breath hitched. Are you crazy?! What…What if she eats us?

Then it'll be a helluva lot more quick and painless compared to what this guy has in store! And even if she wanted to devour us, she'd be fucking all of Konoha over. It'd be more than just losing two military assets.

How bad would it be?

It'd make the Spring of Devastation look like a cakewalk…but she won't eat us. She is no fool. They paused, and as if looking through the world from over the Fox's shoulder, Naruto could see the flames on Mizuki's arms dying out. We need to do it now. Do you remember the sequence?

Naruto swallowed thickly. "Y-Yeah. A little bit…."

Daub your hand in blood and trace the sign while I recite the seals…and when she comes, stay out of her way!

Naruto nodded, and without a second's hesitation he slapped his hand against the wound. He winced as he pulled it back, but he bit his lower lip and curled the upper back in a snarl of concentration. His fingers raced across the grass, swiping here, slashing there. Like magic, the kanji for awakening was formed.

It was like kneeling over the precipice that dropped into an abyss leading to eternity, the jaws of a beast lurking in the darkness for decades biding its time for food and, seeing this small, blonde morsel falling headfirst into the unknown, would open wide and consume him whole. Or perhaps there would only be just darkness, maybe there would be an end to the fall, and if he should reach it he wondered if there would be a light to greet him. What kind of light would that be? To the Pure Lands? Hell? Or something beyond that?

I don't know…and I don't care. Until the day I become Hokage, I won't die! He brought his hands up and, at the Fox's directions, made the seals.

I won't let anyone or anything stop me—

Boar.

Dog.

Not the dissenters, not my enemies, not the malevolence and the hellions.

Bird.

Monkey.

Not even the Lord of Calamity herself! I decide where I want to go!

RAM!

Naruto clapped his hands once and slammed them on the symbol.

"Summoning Technique: Velvet Crowe, Lord of Calamity! AWAKEN!"

---

The dream came to an abrupt end, without fanfare.

It began as the sensation of a hole being poked through the veil of sleep, as if done by a finger, or a knife, or a drill. One was made, and then another. And another. And another, and with each hole the old world melted into darkness and this brave, strange new realm arose in clear, muted light.

The young lad's face crumbled to ash and gave way to another: clad in orange, with blonde hair, blue eyes, and the whisker marks that branded him as the Nine-Tailed Demon Fox's guard and jailer.

He looked so much like him….

"Oh fuck!" a voice, distant and alarmed. The sounds of stamping feet and drawn steel banished the fog like a breath of wind.

She blinked, and beheld the torchlight illuminating her chamber. She saw the face in the fire as much as she could see it within herself.

It's time, Velvet, said the malak.

She rumbled acquiescence and brought up her shackles. Adamantine…mined from the Uzushio quarries and carted to Konoha to be forged into the chains that kept her bound and the blessings of the masked Uzumaki kami that suppressed her malevolence. Both of these abilities forever lost to time, reclaimed by the earth and the seas.

The seals inked and set into the shackles burned away, leaving behind bare metal. She glanced down at her feet and those bindings, too, were gone. The kanji on the floor, the last of the defenses imbued with Lady Mito's fuinjutsu, was swept away as though by the breaking tide.

She tested the manacle on her right arm, pulling gently. Bits of dirt and debris rattled down the wall behind her.

She yanked hard, and shackle and chain snapped in twain.

The gate flew open.

She yanked to the left, and the chains clanged to the floor. She gazed at her arm, flexing her fingers. Someone had changed the bandages recently; they had yellowed, but they were not bloodied.

She had not fed in so long.

I…hunger.

Go to him, said the malak. Your young ward calls for your aid.

My ward….

Memories of the man who had passed his resemblance onto his son, interposed with the man draped in angelic wings, resurfaced, blending bloody, sacred sword and scarlet moons and fire and children together.

She shot to wakefulness.

"HALT!" cried the ANBU, dashing into the cell. He snatched the ofuda off his belt and raised it, the symbols radiating with chakra. "The power of the Sage compels you—!"

He yelled, backing away from the malevolent aura pouring out. The walls cracked and the floor caved in, lending the chamber to a shrinking, concave appearance. The ANBU at their comrade's back assembled around him, watching with awe and dread as the blight morphed into the shade of a faceless, bipedal wolf, its hair long and voluminous and meshing with her torn, black coat. They looked as one, woman and Lord, past the ceiling, past the creeping dawn, past the miasma that ensconced the world in its fell embrace.

There, said the malak.

She found him, superimposing over the scene of the cowering ninja before her. In the forest by the walls encircling the Hidden Village, held up in the air by the hair in the hellion's paw.

Her arm twitched.

Fresh meat.

She broke down before their eyes, atom by atom, until she was no longer wolf and woman but malevolence itself. It hung in the air for that one long, breathless second—

And then it was gone.

---

"LORD HOKAGE!" Inoichi cried, pounding up the steps to the bedroom. He had to have felt it, had to have noticed the sudden drop in temperature that surely must have hit all of Konoha, maybe in all the Elemental Nations and as far away as the West, in that moment. Most would not be awake to feel it, maybe not even realize what had just happened, but they would know in time. For better or worse, from this day onward, the world was forever changed, and so were the lives of all that would interact with Uzumaki Naruto.

He tried not to think of what the future had in store for Ino.

He caught himself on the threshold and doubled over, gasping. "Lord Hokage! The jutsu has been used! Naruto used the jutsu!"

"Aye," said Sarutobi Hiruzen, nodding. "So he has." He looked up from the crystal ball to the window. "The Lord of Calamity walks again."

---

He had been on the verge of blacking out when the sudden change in gravity shocked him awake. The world became dark, cold and damp like the grave, and Naruto coughed and spluttered. He grit his teeth not against the stench but the utter futility of it all: foolishly expending chakra when he should've called it back instead of wasting them admiring his shadow clones, the fire under his arm and the blood running and caking all on his left side, his limbs too numb and heavy to at least try to grab Mizuki's arm and inflict some sort of pathetic scratching on him.

He seethed with rage, not at Mizuki but at himself for being so stupid and weak and desperate for a chance like the selfish little boy he was.

I should've just said no.

I should've just gone back to the Academy like anybody else would and take it more seriously.

He looked upon Mizuki's grinning, triumphant face and despaired. She's not gonna come, Kurama. We're gonna die and she's not gonna die—

The Fox growled, frustrated if not impatient.

Mizuki laughed. "I guess all the fight's done gone out of you, eh, Naruto? That's a waste of chakra, you know! My master always told me to never expend your power all at once, because someday you just might need it. Don't you fret, you'll regain it soon enough—"

It happened quickly, and in the days that would come Naruto would wonder if in his weakened state he imagined it. The dawn was closing in and so the forest was more blue than black, but in that second it had gotten dark, dark like how the storm is past the horizon and right on top of you, your house, and blanketing all but the thinnest sliver of green-white sky, and the air had taken on an electric quality. Here, in that dreamlike instance, dawn became night, and a flash like lightning seared his vision and, very briefly, made him blind.

He recalled as he fell that lightning wasn't supposed to be red.

Or black.

Finally! the Fox said, relieved, and Naruto saw an image of hungry eyes and salivating teeth flash through his mind.

He sat up, nearly falling back at the sight of a transparent shape encircling him protectively. It had the body of a wolf but the head was a cross between that and something reptilian, perforated with scales, horns, and a high, upswept frill like a crown on its nape. It stared down at him, lending Naruto the impression it was studying him, judging him. What little gaze he could decipher in those flame-etched eyes was cold, detached, and imperious. He shrank further into the ground, eyes roaming up past its thick faux-hide where its body melded into the cloak of malevolence.

His mouth went agape.

She didn't have a wolf's head. She didn't have wings or horns or was a walking, fiery tempest like some of his classmates said she had, in those days where their youth was innocent and not yet fully blossomed. The world didn't explode into scorched earth nor did it blacken with the herald of thunder. Her aura did not steal the breath out of his lungs or crush him to immediate suffocation, but he had forgotten to breathe and the tightness in them reminded him to forego that same breath in an unceremonious stream.

She…was human. Black hair that went all the way past muscular legs and ended in a small tail tied with a white ribbon. Pale skin peeking in between the tatters of leather pants and the long, black and red-lined coat. The bandaged left arm. Steel boots and a vambrace on her right arm, blade extended.

It dripped with blood.

"It's you," Naruto whispered, awestruck. "Velvet Crowe." She turned her head slightly and peered at him with one amber eye.

Mizuki raised his arm and gawked stupidly at the inch of bone protruding from the stump. He glanced at the shorn piece writhing on the ground, back at the stump, and then at the woman. "The Lord of Calamity," he breathed, and Velvet regarded him fully, expressionless. Mizuki giggled. "By the Sage…! It really is you! H-How…How long has it been since you've been outside? Five years? Twelve? Fifteen? Oh, what does it matter, you're here now and in the flesh! The Butcher of the West, the Harbinger of the End of Days, walking the land of shinobi once again!"

Velvet said nothing.

Mizuki backed away. "H-How does it feel, Lord Velvet? Y-You must be terribly, terribly hungry. You can feel it, don't you? Food just won't do. I-I can give you all the souls you desire until you're fit to burst! You will not be found wanting for weeks! Months! Everything you want, everything you dreamed of in that wretched hole, Lord Orochimaru will grant it to you! You will not find these things anywhere else! W-Wouldn't you like that?"

Velvet didn't respond. She looked at Naruto again. "Watch me."

Naruto blinked. "H-Huh?"

"Just this once." Her voice was smooth and deep. "I will show you what it means to endure." She flicked the blade once, dashing blood on the grass. Malevolence spewed from the bandages.

Mizuki held his paw and stump up in a placating gesture. "W-Wait! How about we talk this over? Please? No. No…no no no NONONONO—!"

The giant red claw grabbed him by the head and slammed him up against the tree. He screamed into her hand. She silenced him by shoving the blade into his chest one-two-three times, splashing blood on herself. He screamed again, high and keen like an animal, and she silenced him forever by chopping into the meat of his neck with several, rabbit-quick chops.

She pressed her claw deeper into the tree, trapping his head and body in a life-sized indentation wracked with fissures. The scaled wolf appraised Naruto one more time, brushed its nose into his hair, before being snuffed out like a candle.

The arm pulsed a volcanic red.

Don't look away, Kurama told Naruto, and he was stunned to hear an emotion he'd never guessed the Fox knew nor could express: tight, raw fear. This is the nature of a therion. We must provide.

For how long? he asked.

…I don't know.

And Naruto watched, dumbstruck, amazed, and horrified as Velvet fed on Mizuki, sucked him up into her arm like liquid through a straw. All the while, his body disintegrated in wisps of malevolence and chakra, stripping away the hellion and revealing the face of a man locked in terror and torture. Then that, too, fell apart.

In two minutes, Mizuki, formerly of Konoha, was no more.

Velvet stepped away from the tree and let her claw drop to her side. A flurry of malevolence swirled around it in a black tornado, and before Naruto's eyes the demonic arm shrank and became human again. The blight soaked into her, diminishing the aura until it receded completely and the area did not seethe with it. She clenched her fist, and the blade retreated into the vambrace.

She turned around to face him. Blood flecked her cheek and dribbled down the slope of her neck, past the hollow of her throat and the bottleneck between her breasts. The first rays of dawnlight peeked through the trees, catching the blood and turning them into glittering rubies.

Naruto sighed wearily. He didn't back away even if he could; he stayed where he was as she walked up to him. Her gait was strong, straight, assured—the stride of a woman come out of the annals of history that played like a dream.

The stride of the Lord of Calamity.

So beautiful.

He welcomed the darkness just before he hit the ground.