Horizon
A Naruto & KKMaou fanfic by Jetede.
Standard disclaimer apply… We all know I don't own Naruto or Kyou Kara Maou.
Warning: Spoilers up to chapter 354!
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Horizon…such a simple word with a huge meaning behind it.
The human dictionary described horizon as 'the line or circle that forms the apparent boundary between earth and sky'. While a sensible horizon is 'the small circle of the celestial sphere whose plane is tangent to the earth at the position of a given observer, or the plane of such a circle,' a rational horizon is 'the great circle of the celestial sphere whose plane passes through the center of the earth and is parallel to the sensible horizon of a given position, or the plane of such a circle. Sometimes it is also called the celestial horizon
The horizon separates the earth from the sky. In reality, that's not its only job…the horizon does not only separate, but it is also the last line of defense between two worlds.
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Chapter 3: Fate and Choice
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'Damn those 'tourists' and their foreign language. In the end, I couldn't find anything about what they were discussing about. I'll have to ask someone to help me read these books. Tch, Mendoukusei…'
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"A ryo for your thoughts?"
"Ohayou gozaimasu, Icchan."
"Ohayou, Naru."
It had been a few days since the four found the information in Konoha Library. Murata had decided to let the Konoha-nins suffer a bit while trying to figure out what they were onto before revealing themselves to them. That's why for the past few days, the two mazokus have been enjoying their 'vacation' in the village, buying all kinds of different food and souvenirs like how tourists normally are. Sometimes they would go back to the library to do some more reading.
That morning, Itachi found Naruto sitting on the blond's favorite spot in Konoha: on top of the head of the Yondaime Hokage of the Hokage Monument. Naruto was sitting in between the Yondaime's spiky tresses, looking across the village, enjoying the first rays of sunrise as it washed out the dull greys of the village into different bursts of colors.
Itachi invited himself to sit next to Naruto. The latter instinctively leaned his head on his companion's left shoulder and stayed there, still watching the horizon as it slowly turned from warm orangey-yellow into light blue. They could hear the birds stirring and chirping in the forest behind them, welcoming the new day.
"What are you thinking about?"
"I've been thinking about everything, I guess…from the beginning of my life eighteen years ago until the most recent events. Who would've thought that my life could be so complicated?" Naruto snorted. He buried his head further into the crook between Itachi's neck and shoulder. Both of them were still in their special henge and wearing their traveling clothes.
The four of them had been staying at an inn by the heart of the village since Shikamaru was keeping a close watch on them. They were positive that by then, the Hokage was already alerted of their existence in the village. Sometimes Naruto would feel a different chakra signature of one of his friends spying on them—most of the times it would either be Shika, Kiba, or Shino, since they were part of the ANBU reconnaissance unit, and would be the best for spying. Naruto was almost worried that they would recognize him and Itachi by their scent, especially since both Kiba and Shino had encountered Uchiha Itachi during their special mission several years ago, to hunt the very same person who was currently sitting next to him, just before he went missing.
Speaking of spying, both Naruto and Itachi could feel the suppressed chakra of a different person today.
'Wait, is that Kakashi-sensei?' Naruto smiled inwardly. 'Ah, Pakkun is out as well.' No doubt to try to sniff out their scents. Of course that old hag of a Hokage would send Kakashi-sensei and Pakkun here. After all, they have encountered the elder Uchiha several times in the past.
'They probably thought we had something to do with Akatsuki, or something. I guess they've taken the village security up a notch since I've been gone.'
"Cyclops and his favorite dog-summon are here," Naruto said in mazoku language.
"Aa, I know. Worried?" replied Itachi.
Naruto snorted again. "Hardly. Besides, it's not like we're really trying to hide. They would find out about us sooner or later…sooner if not for the fact that Yuuri and Murata are enjoying this too much. Then again, I owe the old hag an explanation about why I've been missing for the last two and a half years." He paused. "You know, you'll have to explain to them what really happened ten years ago."
Itachi's eyes darkened. "There's nothing to explain."
"Ita—"
"The fact of the matter is…I did kill them, Naru. Nothing could change the fact that the clan died by my hands."
"But it wasn't your fault! If anything, it was mine! It was my fault that your family and your clan died!" Naruto shouted.
"Listen to me, Naru. It was NOT your fault." Itachi said to Naruto as he held the latter's shoulders by both of his hands. "Never, never ever blame yourself for what happened that night. Do you hear me?" Naruto slowly nodded as he bit his bottom lip until it bled. "Besides, if it's not because of you, I wouldn't be here now."
Both were quiet for a few seconds after that. "…y—" Naruto whispered. "…why me?"
Itachi contemplated before answering, "You're the Chosen One—Yuuri Maou Heika said that, didn't he?"
"Aah…" Naruto snorted again. "I never thought that there would come a day where I will succumb to something called Destiny or Fate."
"You're a bad liar and you, yourself know it."
Naruto smiled. "I can't hide anything from you, can I?"
Itachi returned the gesture with his own small smile. "Well, you're the one who told me that Fate does not exist. We choose our own path. We may have been provided with several selections of these so called paths, but in the end, it's our decision to choose which one we will take." He paused. "The MaOu himself faced a similar kind of decision making during his time, didn't he?—so did the Great Sage before him."
Itachi put his right hand under Naruto's jaw to turn his head so he could look directly at him. Naruto's eyes were glazed with unshed tears.
"I told you, no matter what you choose, I'll support you all the way. You don't have to face this alone." Itachi caressed his cheek and leaned forward. Naruto closed his eyes as Itachi kissed his forehead tenderly. A tear dropped to his other cheek from one of his closed eyes. Itachi moved to kiss that cheek next and continued down to Naruto's abused lips. His own lips met Naruto's in a tender, passionate kiss while Naruto responded as eagerly. Both of them didn't care that they were being watched—they were going to find out about their relationship sooner or later anyway.
"You know, I would actually prefer kissing your real self instead of a henged version of you. It feels like I'm somehow cheating on you this way." Itachi said teasingly as they finally separated. Naruto laughed as he leaned his head on the elder Uchiha's chest. He put his arms around Itachi's shoulders and back and hugged him closer.
Itachi hugged Naruto back with an unspoken gesture of 'I'll always be here for you, koi.'
'I know, Itachi. Thank you.'
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"Are you sure they were reading these texts at the library, Shikamaru?"
Sakura, Tenten, Shikamaru and Hinata were at one of the conference rooms at the Hokage Tower, reading and researching on the books and scrolls Shikamaru checked out several days ago after spying on the four. Sakura was the one who asked the question.
"Yes. I checked them out from the library as soon as they left them on the collection table."
"Well, these are texts about the history of Hi no Kuni and Elemental Continent," Sakura pointed to the ones right in front of her. "While those ones focus more on the different existing legends and myths around the world, some written in our language and some others in an old language called English. I mean, these guys are travelers right? It's not strange for them to be interested in history and myths. For all we know, they could be traveling scholars of some sort."
"Sakura is right, Shikamaru. What made you so suspicious of them, anyway?" asked Hinata.
The three girls were asked by the strategist to help him in reading the texts since there was no way for him to do it by himself. Sakura was the best choice since she's the smartest kunoichi in their group, while Hinata was the most diligent, and Tenten was a perfectionist—therefore they're the perfect candidates for the research mission. The Godaime Hokage even made it an official B-rank mission since it involved the very safety of the village, and not to mention: heavy research.
"Mendoukusei…think about it. These so-called tourists know at least 3 different languages—proficient enough that they were able to read some of these older texts written in English. No ordinary people still have the knowledge on that language—at least not the ones from Elemental Continent. They were also talking in our language and another weird foreign language I've never heard before. I don't think these are mere travelers, Hinata."
"Are you saying that these people might have something to do with that chakra surge several nights ago?" asked Tenten.
"I'm not sure, but isn't it rather convenient that all of a sudden we got four 'scholars' visiting our village the day after the chakra blast?" Shikamaru retorted.
"Hmm… that does sound suspicious, I guess." Sakura replied. "How did you manage to come across them? And what do these guys look like?"
"Ichiraku Ramen—the day after the incident, during lunch time—we were all there, actually. When we were talking about the chakra surge and the possibility of Kyuubi or Naruto being involved, one of the guys reacted all of a sudden." Shikamaru replied. "They're around late teens, if not early twenties—our age, I suppose. Four guys, two of them had black hair and eyes, while the other two had different shades of brown hair. One of them had green eyes and the other, hazel. They were wearing regular civilian clothing. So far I've had Shino and Kiba helping me following them around town for the past several days, and today, Kakashi-san volunteered to help."
"Even Kakashi-sensei?" Sakura asked, surprised.
"Kakashi-san and Pakkun are spying on the two with brown hair this morning, while Kiba's on the other two. They seem to know something about Kyuubi, and possibly about Naruto as well."
"Do you think they might be Akatsuki?" Hinata asked.
"It's possible. We know they haven't given up on looking for Naruto since he went missing two and a half years ago. It's like he was gone from the surface of the earth. Even Jiraiya-sama's spy network wasn't able to gather any information at all." Tenten added.
"Akatsuki work in pairs, though. If these people were in Akatsuki, or at least, related to the organization, then it would've been a really serious matter for four of their members to be here in Konoha." Hinata said again.
"What are the chances of them coming in here to investigate the chakra surge?" Sakura asked.
"Very little. Unless…they happened to be around Konoha during that night, and decided to investigate it the morning after—which is a possibility, since they're rather obsessed with Kyuubi—the only bijuu they haven't been able to extract so far. For all we know, that chakra surge was so powerful that it might have reached miles outside of Konoha." Shikamaru answered with his face scrunched in deep thought.
"But what would all these—" Tenten motioned her hands over the books and scrolls on the table, "have anything to do with Akatsuki and the bijuu, or the chakra surge?
Shikamaru furrowed his brows even further. "That one, I'm still having a hard time figuring out myself, Tenten." He paused. "But whatever it is, it's big—probably bigger than anything we've ever known before."
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Kakashi was keeping a close watch over the two suspicious travelers on top of the Hokage Mountain with Pakkun from within the thick foliage of the trees of the forest behind the Hokage heads, when all of a sudden they started talking in a weird foreign language. Not long after they started talking, suddenly they started arguing over something. 'Damn the language barrier! It's rather useless to spy on someone if you don't understand what they're talking about.' He noticed, however, that Pakkun was scrunching his face in thought.
"What is it?" Kakashi whispered to his favorite nin-dog summon.
"They're talking in an ancient language," answered Pakkun. "I didn't even know that there are still some humans who could speak that language." Now that drew Kakashi's interest to the max.
"Human?" Kakashi asked while still keeping his single exposed eye to the two young men. "You mean to tell me that you understand what they're saying?"
"No. Like I told you, it's an ancient language. I thought it's lost forever."
Kakashi was disturbed by the revelation. The term 'humans' the summoned nin-dog used, did not go unnoticed by the ANBU Captain. Yes, Kakashi went back to the ANBU not long after Naruto's missing. Besides, most of his colleagues' students were in ANBU already. He really did not want to take any other genin team, ever again—at least not until they found Naruto, and possibly, bring Sasuke back. Team 7-turned-Team Kakashi was going to be the only one for him. Just as he finished that train of thoughts, things suddenly became more interesting. The two he was spying on were apparently a couple.
'Ara…now that's an interesting development,' he thought as the two kissed. 'I wonder what Iruka is doing right now.'
Just when he was about to relax and enjoy the show, the two separated from their hug and stood up from their sitting position on the Yondaime's head. They started to make their way back on the solid ground behind them. The taller of the two was helping the other one so he wouldn't accidentally fall off the cliff—or so Kakashi thought—when all of a sudden, the shorter one looked across the clearing, straight towards his eyes. Kakashi and Pakkun stiffened.
'Shit! He knows I'm here? That's impossible! I'm hidden under the thickest foliage and made sure to compress my chakra to the lowest level. They're definitely not your regular tourists.
Kakashi was starting to reach towards his kunai holder while his left hand slowly reached up towards his hitai-ate, preparing to expose his single Sharingan eye. He noticed that they started conversing in that weird ancient language again and the other one also looked at him. To his surprise, the shorter one actually waved his hand and smiled at him while the latter looked amused.
Kakashi uncovered his Sharingan immediately. He blinked. All of a sudden, both of them were gone.
"What the…" He jumped down from his perch on the tree branch together with Pakkun and started running towards the spot where the two strangers were standing on before. Pakkun started sniffing around the area.
"They're gone," Pakkun said. Confusion was etched all over his features.
"Kuso!"
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A/N: Well that was a short chapter. As promised, now we've finally seen some ItaNaru fluff. There will be more of those in the future chapters, don't worry about it. Hehe. Hopefully you guys like this chapter as well. There are some more unveiled mysteries that connect to Naruto and Itachi's disappearance for the past two and a half years. Is Naruto still human or is he a demon? Hehe now that's a secret for now…Things will be explained in the next few chapters, so you guys don't have to worry about that either.
And yes, I will be overworking Shikamaru's brain throughout this story. That lazy-ass genius of a strategist had it coming, I tell ya! Haha. I love Shikamaru. Also, since Yuuri and Wolfram had a major role in the previous chapter, I decided to dedicate this one to Itachi and Naruto. Our two favorite mazoku kings are going to show up again soon. Sasuke and Team Hebi, and Akatsuki are going to make their appearance soon as well.
In case you were wondering about the timeline… Naruto-tachi are 18-19 in this story, while Itachi is about 23-24 (he was 13 when he slaughtered his clan). Naruto went missing when he was about 15 and a half. Yuuri, Murata, and Kyuubi (Wolfram) are between 1000-2000 years old by now—they're ancient! hehe. Things are rather unclear when it concerns the two mazoku since time flows differently and rather randomly between the two worlds.