A/N: I will say this often, because I cannot help it, but this chapter really did run away from me as I wrote more and more about it. I didn't expect to find such inspiration in writing a more or less much more serious in tone chapter and yet, I did find it eventually. I had a basic map of what I wanted to talk about this chapter but other plot bunnies forced their way and completely dominated the landscape of this chapter. For those who actually read my notes, I'll say this: This chapter is not nearly as funny as previous chapters, because it isn't intended to be. I admit whole heartedly my great love of Minato, and if you've read this far, I am sure you have a certain attachment to him as well. Well, for as funny as he can be he deserves some stress relief too. From a plot and characterization stand point I am oddly proud of this chapter, which is rare on my end. So with that in mind, clearly everyone is going to absolutely hate it, as it is never good when the writer likes his own work!

Also as the holidays hit their full swing, I am not sure how long it is going to take me to update. However, it speaks well for the odds that I am not going to get stuck too long that I had three whole scenes pretty vividly mapped out for THIS chapter that got pushed to the next chapter because I am trying to normalize my chapter size a bit. So creatively speaking, I am on one of the best rolls I have ever been, and since I usually get positive reviews, I am going to say that's a good thing for you guys.

Review Reponses:

Slingshot: I like to think I am merely extremely skilled at portraying sadism, and that's the story I am going to stick to at this moment.

Hisoka: Well, I hope you enjoy Hidan getting owned, I did my best to think of something unique, because I pride myself on not my writing ability, but my ability to be imaginative with torture! Wait, that didn't sound right…

Crayontesla: A problem with my canon? Tell me your problem with my canon after this chapter, I think you underestimated my ability to be awesome, though!

Litewarior4: Nick is based off a friend of mine who is rather dour and obsessed with foxes. I don't exactly name drop often like that, but I saw a potential in my friend's personality to translate to a funny character, and since it was his personality I based it off of, I was obligated to name him after my friend.

Anyway you guys probably are skipping this anyway as I left you with such an evil cliffhanger last time, so I'll shut up. Enjoy.

Chapter 20: Where a Scary Man Meets a Scarier Man

The Shinigami settled into his seat and began to munch on his popcorn as he waited for the action to begin. The room around him darkened as the large screen in front of him turned on and he began to eat his buttery treat with greater fervor, knowing he would enjoy the upcoming presentation of how to kick a man's ass greatly.

Before your feature begins please enjoy these previews from our sponsors! The Shinigami's face began to twitch as he tossed his bag of popcorn to the side and pouted with all of the force of eight twelve year old girls, which is frankly a staggering amount. And yes, pouts are measured in units of twelve year old girls*(1).

"Damn sponsors, I am going torture someone for this delay of my entertainment, and it will be a glorious torturing indeed." The Shinigami's threat, as always, was not an idle one. With a sigh, he watched the messages from the sponsors with little interest.

Hidan was a young boy, just five years old, stumbling upon a brick path. He was completely lost and he was very scared. He had never been separated from his parents before, and his little legs could only carry him so far. He had begged his parents to take him with them on their trip for a very long time, and with great hesitance, they had finally relented. So of course within an hour of arriving in this new town he had wandered off and gotten lost.

He found himself in front of an impossibly tall temple of some sort on the edge of the town. Stone steps piled in front of it for what seemed to be miles on top of a giant hill. Hidan could barely make out the symbol on top of the shrine that read "Jashin" in dark red letters. Hidan did not know why, but he felt a sudden terrible feeling when he read the name, as if something horrible was hidden within the name, something anciently evil. Hidan's first, second, and last instinct was to run away from that shrine as fast as he possibly could. His young legs shook as he slowly backed up, right into a figure that had not been there moment's ago.

"I say young man; it is wise to watch where you are going. People less friendly than me might take some matter of offense at being run into so roughly." Hidan did not understand what some of those words meant, but the gentle hand on his shoulder comforted him, the voice seemed friendly enough. Craning his neck to see the man towering over him, he squint his eyes in confusion. The man looked so average in every respect; it was jarring, even to a five year old. The man smiled benignly up at the boy.

"How about I take you to my temple up these stairs and I can get you a warm drink?" This triggered alarms in Hidan's young mind, as he had heard from his parents what happened to little boys who went to shrines with seemingly ordinary older men – it never ended well. Sadly for the little boy, the man did not allow his grip on the boy's shoulder to falter, so the boy's attempts to run away proved to be fruitless.

"I insist, Hidan-san." With those words, the young boy known as Hidan died, and he was replaced with a monster.

Jashin always was impressed with his own ability to break a target's mind, especially if you started young. It started so simple, everyone had someone they wanted to please in their life, and he simply took that fervent need and manipulated it to his own ends. They always had the choice to not sign their lives and souls over to him; it was said at every step. At every decision, they could be freed of his grasp. It didn't matter to him that he had expertly crafted all of his subjects to always refuse, if you gave the option, it was still willing. Although in the case of Hidan he needn't have tried so hard, the boy had a cruel streak a mile wide. Years later even he was impressed with the way his protégé had tortured his parents into a slow, agonizing death. Hidan had been his star pupil who had enjoyed a meteoric rise to infamy in the shinobi world, thanks to the gifts of his sponsor god.

But as with all good things, it came to its end. It always did.

Hidan awoke groggily, his head pounding. He tried to focus his vision but couldn't, his surroundings remain blurry even as he tries to stumble to his feet.

"You know, I thought you were an S-Class Ninja, yet here you are stumbling around from a single blow. That Jashin guy must have severely low standards for his underlings if you are considered his best one." Hidan snarled in his fury, and then promptly fell down on his ass as he tried to lash out at the speaker only to unbalance himself.

"Don't you dare speak Jashin's name! Your mouth isn't worthy!" Hidan picked himself up off the ground and stumbled around some more, his vision nothing but a blur of color and lights. The last thing he remembered was the Yondaime Hokage, a man dead for a good fifteen years now, standing in front of him. That's right, he was dead. Trapped by that fucking brat, he thought he would have had more time to plan an escape, death had come suddenly.

Now here he was, nearly blind in front of an opponent who had only been defeated by an opponent said to be able to sink whole countries in a night's time, and it was on his terms. What fucking bullshit!

Minato crossed the few feet between them and backhanded Hidan hard, knocking him back down to the ground; the knock cleared the man's head a bit as his vision cleared up to see his surroundings.

"Welcome to hell, as I said, Hidan-san." Hidan looked directly into Minato's eyes and saw nothing but triumph in his eyes, total and certain victory.

"Hell cannot contain a servant of Jashin, you fool!" Hidan began to laugh at the man, not yet grasping his situation in the least.

Minato, however, was not in his usual carefree mood.

He roughly grabbed Hidan by the collar of his cloak and threw him a good ten feet into a brick wall, into which Hidan slammed into with all of the grace of a truck. The wall won, not giving an inch. Hidan moaned as he crumpled to the floor, his back and head throbbing in a way he hadn't felt in years.

"The trouble with people like you Hidan is that you tout the virtues of murder and death but you hide behind greater powers than yourself to avoid it." Minato's voice was void of any ill intent and so quiet that Hidan could clearly make out the sound of the man's boots as the blonde approached him at a steady pace. Minato reached Hidan and grabbed himself a handful of the man's hair and yanked him up by it, which was rather painful if the yell out of the grey-haired man was any indicator. Hidan took a wild swing at Minato who seemed to smirk at the oncoming fist; his head was out of harm's way well before the punch got anywhere near him, as if he knew where the punch was supposed to land before it had even began its motion, it missed its mark by a good two feet. Hidan didn't have time to ponder how a man could be that fast as Minato's knee crashed into his stomach causing Hidan to cough up some of his own blood. Minato watched the blood leak out of Hidan's mouth onto the ground, and he quite liked the look of this man's blood. He drove his knee into his stomach repeatedly, each time with equal force as the first one, each time causing Hidan cough up more and more blood until Minato relented and let go of the man's hair. Without the support from Minato, Hidan collapsed on the ground, clutching his stomach. Hidan gritted his teeth so he wouldn't yell out. It had been years since he had felt this much pain, all from a few simple kicks? Minato was not interested in giving Hidan a reprieve, however, as he landed a swift kick to ritual specialist's knee. This time, Hidan could not help but to scream.

"So," Minato's voice was elevated to be heard over Hidan's terrible screams, "You must be wondering right about now why there are genin out there that can take more of a beating than your sorry ass. Let me tell you a little something about me, Hidan. I am a very good at what I do; always have been. I made an entire nation bow to me before I turned twenty. I defied every long shot odd I had in my entire life and attained my dream of being Hokage. I matched powers with the nine-tailed fox and proved to be its equal. Do you want to know why you are weak to my attacks? Because I fucking will it to be so!" Minato was supremely satisfied that Hidan's eyes widened momentarily, his speech instilling a deep fear within the man.

Well, not strictly true, it actually has more to do with the fact that his soul, his true self, is actually pathetically weak. Having spent all of those years as a devout worshipper of Jashin, that 'god' had taken his miserable soul for a spin and left him with barely more than a dust ball and a "thanks for the meal, dumbass" note. Of course, Hidan couldn't give a damn about it until he was on the floor right now. The prices some men pay for power and the eyes that will turn blind in the face of corruption.

Thinking about that made Minato's anger come back in full force, as he delivered another kick to the man's already broken knee, eliciting another scream.

Hidan, even though he was in pain, laughed defiantly at the blonde haired ninja, although how much fight he actually had left in him was indeterminable.

"Jashin will save me; a heretic like you is nothing! Do you hear me? Fucking nothing!" Hidan's voice contained no small amount of madness; his mind not firmly entrenched into his current reality.

If Hidan was a little more aware, he would have noticed Minato's face break out into a grin, and what a terrible grin it was. He pulled Hidan's file from thin air and took out the letter that Jashin had given him just a couple of days earlier.

"I am afraid Jashin has already informed me that he has had a bad investment in you and no longer requires your services, nor cares what I do with you." Minato sat the piece of paper by Hidan's bloodied form. He eyed it wearily for a moment before he took it in his hand and read it slowly, as you don't read any other way when your head was pounding as much as Hidan's was. His eyes widened in fury the more he read. The straw that broke the camel's back, however, was the note at the end.

"Have whatever fun you want with him, Minato-kun, he has failed me one too many times. I hope you enjoy this present; I am a man who rarely gives them out.

Sincerely,

Jashin"

Hidan got up, his body seemingly recovering from the brutal beating that Minato had delivered to him mere moments before. His eyes no longer held even the faintest hint of sanity.

"I AM GOING TO FUCKING KILL YOU!" Hidan's scythe appeared in his hands as he rushed forward, faster than ever, intent on cutting Minato to pieces.

Minato's eyes narrowed as his body went rigid in anticipation.

The last desperate gasp before accepting your torment I see. Very well, Hidan, I will make sure to give your overinflated sense of pride its proper respect. Minato was focused intently on Hidan, who looked to be in slow motion from Minato's perspective.

The world of the living, the world of the dead; It simply didn't matter. No matter where Hidan and Minato could have possibly met on the battlefield…

Outclassed was too generous of a word to describe the difference between these two men.

Minato had a rasengan in his right hand almost instantly. This time, however, he decided to add some fire to its composition. After all, he needed practice with his weakest element every now and again.

Minato leapt right at Hidan, his shoulders lowering to give him the image of a rocket firing right at Hidan. His right hand extended just as he was about to pass Hidan, his fire imbued rasengan smashed into the man's midsection. Hidan immediately wished he had not picked this fight. His screams were music to the Minato's ears, a part of him reveling in the complete agony of the other man. Minato watched without a care as the force of his technique violently pushed Hidan into the same wall he had just been kicked into earlier. However this time the sturdy wall was no match for the impact of Hidan's body, as it was smashed apart. Hidan's burning flesh began to fill the air with its odor as he screamed, begging someone, anyone, to save him.

Hidan did not know how long he was on the ground, burning from the inside seemingly. The flames were consuming his wicked soul, cooking him while he was very much aware that he was being cooked. It had to have been hours before the flames finally subsided.*(2) Hidan, his sanity returning to him from amongst the flames, looked in horror at the blonde haired man slowly approaching him.

"What are you?" Hidan's voice was fearful, his fighting spirit completely shattered. He was defeated in every sense of the word. His defiance that he had so proudly displayed mere moments before with such gusto had been torn apart before the horrible fury of the Yellow Flash. Minato towered over him for a moment, causing Hidan to flinch. Minato lingered above him smirking at the reaction before taking a seat right next to the man, staring out at the distant sun as Hidan's body was too exhausted to move away.

When Minato spoke his voice was calm, and his body was at ease. It appeared that Minato had satisfied his immediate want to hurt the man.

"I am a man, just like any other. The difference between us is not what that of a human and something beyond that, but of weak and strong. You, all your life, have given more and more of yourself over to Jashin. Your soul is now not only corrupt, but weak. If you place your faith and your power into something that doesn't respect you, you will end up in such a sorry state such as this. Everyone has the chance to make the right choices, Hidan. You could have refused his offer that day. You could have been ashamed of ever being asked to kill someone and told him that was that. You could have chosen not to kill innocent people, to kill children. You could have done so many things to save yourself from this fate, but you never did. "

Hidan did not deny it. For all of his hatred of the man, even a fool such as Hidan could not hide the truth that was evident in front of him: He had fucked up, big time. He had thought that the powers granted to him by the great Jashin would be enough. They had been for a long time, but it seemed that this man's passion was stronger than even his god. He spared a glance at Minato who was looking forward, his face calm, his eyes at peace. It was hard to believe mere minutes before this man had been delivering him a savage beating that he thought was never going to end. There were many rumors, stories, and tall tales surrounding Namikaze Minato, Konoha's Yellow Flash. You could not go through Iwa without hearing horror stories in the old taverns; even after fifteen years since the man was alive.

Flashback

Hidan had finally snuck away from his partner and decided to have a drink of water at the local tavern. After all, even homicidal and psychotic killers needed to quench their thirst every once in awhile. He went up to the barkeep and ordered a glass of water, the man raised an eyebrow but didn't say anything as he handed the silver haired man his drink.

Hidan could not help but overhear an elderly Iwa ninja's frantic discussion with a much younger man at a nearby table.

"You don't understand young man; you are simply not old enough to remember. The Yellow Flash was not some kind of mere ninja; he was a monster of incredible destruction. The worst part is that even though Konoha is famous for their many bloodlines, which are rare around the world, this man had none. It was the simple fact that you couldn't even console yourself with the fact that he was gifted with something that we could not obtain. It was so perfectly rubbed in our faces; he just was a better ninja than all of our forces combined through hard work. Every kill was done in one blow, every trap executed to perfection. You can't beat a God, young man; you simply can't best a man who never makes a mistake. That was what we dealt with when we dealt with that yellow devil." The elderly man's hoarse voice added some credence to the tale, his fear was still palpable.

Hidan breathed in deeply, loving that scent. Fear was absolutely wonderful. He looked at his glass of water with an evil smile on my face.

"Well, I have relieved myself of my thirst, now it is time to whet my appetite." With that said his body transformed into the ritualistic black and white and laughed as the screams of the people began to echo in the small tavern.

End Flashback

Now Hidan understood perfectly. He was doomed, and he had no one to blame but himself. Granted, he was not repentant in the least, and he still loathed the man in front of him. His evil soul was still evil, but he was not quite as delusional as he had been to start the day.

Minato looked over at him and smiled in a fashion that Hidan had a suspicion he could not trust.

"Although this area isn't much right now, just a few abandoned homes from a long lost nomadic tribe, in around five hundred years or so it will begin to blossom into a village. Quite the boring village as far as history is concerned, really. No one ever died here, no one ever went away to become something great. It is simply families, living, loving each other, eventually dying, leaving the new generation to repeat the cycle." Minato looked fondly at the future village, a spark of something that Hidan could not describe in Minato's eyes as he did so.

It was reasonable, how could a man who had never been fond of anything or loved anyone know such emotions reflected in another?

"So, why are we here then?" Hidan's question elicited a chuckle from Minato, which caused the Akatsuki member to tense.

"This is your punishment. For the rest of your existence you are going to do nothing but watch over this village, and see what life is truly worth. You have no concept of what life is, Hidan, you could not possibly understand the gravity of what you have done. There are countless villages like this across many worlds, and although I have no way to interact with them it is an easy matter to place you here. You are restricted to the boundaries of this small village, and when it ceases to be, another village, and then another. I thought of just beating the living shit out of you for a good long while, but you understand pain and suffering too well. Eventually you'd harden yourself, it'd lose meaning. One day, Hidan-san, one day you are going to realize the weight of your deeds. On that day you will scream, you will scream so loud and in so much suffering that I will have no choice but to step into this realm and witness with glee how your own mind turns against you for the acts you have committed. Mark my words, proud member of Akatsuki, that day will come and I look forward to it more than you could ever imagine."

Minato jumped up and dusted off his pants. He opened a portal to the white space before Hidan stopped him.

"You said I placed my faith in something that didn't respect me back, what did you place your faith in?" The question was said neutrally enough, but Minato understood the befuddlement behind the question.

"The Will of Fire, something you wouldn't understand if I spent a thousand lifetimes explaining it to you, I am afraid. Farewell." With his final parting Minato vanished, leaving Hidan alone with his thoughts.

That stupid prick, there is no way that had a grain of truth in it. It is going to take more than that to break me, fucking bastard.

Although Hidan thought it very strongly and forcefully, there was a kernel of doubt in the darkest corners of his mind. That kernel would one day grow, just as Minato had predicted, and it would consume him in ways that Minato himself could never dream to do so.

Minato appeared in the white space to see the Shinigami appearing gleeful for an unknown reason. In fact, his boss had been very absent recent, which was very unusual, as the death god was as overbearing as anyone Minato had ever met.

"Shinigami-sama, what have you been up to lately? You've been very scarce." The Shinigami responded quickly.

"I have been plotting." The ghastly figure winced mentally, realizing he had said that out of pure ego and reflex. That was probably not a good thing to admit to in front of the curious blonde in front of him.

Minato raised an eyebrow at the response.

"Plotting what, exactly?" The Shinigami, in all of his greatness, came up with the perfect answer that explained everything perfectly in a very reasonable manner.

"An acre of land, what's it to you?" With that crisp response, the Shinigami vanished from the white space, leaving the blonde haired man stuck there in a state between confusion and outrage. Was he sincerely supposed to buy such a load of crap?

With another sigh Minato went over to his desk and was about to sit down when he saw a note in Zabuza's handwriting. He picked it up and read it.

"Kakuzu of Akatsuki died, since you were preoccupied with his partner I decided to judge him myself, didn't think you'd mind,

Zabuza"

Minato blinked once. Then he blinked again. By the time his eyes had opened from his third blink the previously pristine white space had turned pitch black, and the only visible light out of the dark recesses of the room were the yellow eyes of Namikaze Minato.

"ZABUZA!" The man, eighteen dimensions away, pissed his pants as everyone in the afterlife heard the blonde man's cry.

(1) No one quite knows why someone thought of measuring pouts in this manner, nor did anyone ever bother to question such a thing until several decades after the system was put into place. By that time it was far too late to change it and everyone had to adjust to the weird term whenever it was brought up. There has been some debate over the issue recently, however, with the unstable pout principle introduced by one Justin Crossing that states that there is no way to truly quantify the exact amount in a unit of twelve year old girl pout, and in many cases using a generalized number would not be nearly specific enough for scientific research. When people questioned why anyone was looking at pouts in a scientific context, Justin Crossing promptly shut up and disappeared from the face of the earth.

(2) It should be noted that while Hidan believed it to be hours, in actuality it was more around ten seconds before the fire had snuffed itself out. Minato had designed this variant of his famous technique to not deal quite as much blunt damage as some of its other forms, but to cause an extreme amount of pain. He was quite pleased with the result of this particular trial, as the first six people he had tried it on had their souls burnt to fiery crisps. That particular incident took some smooth talking with the overseer of hell, who had been assured by a very confident Minato that his prisoners would not be harmed above a certain extent.

A/N: I hope you guys enjoyed that, I certainly did enjoy writing it. It took me about three sittings to write it all, with the last fifteen hundred being this morning. I can't believe that I am less than ten thousand words away from having a story with one hundred thousand words, how insane is that? I know there are stories that make that look like a joke, but still, it is staggering thing to think about.

Speaking of random stuff, I should note that this fanfiction does have a forum that I never use before I never link to it. If any of you would like to discuss this fiction with me or your fellow fans, or would like to hear me talk about how a chapter is progressing, it'd be a good place to go. Hell, I'll even take suggestions on what to possibly include in some future chapters. My story isn't exactly set in stone, and it for sure isn't from chapter to chapter, if this chapter is any evidence. If I find an idea funny, I'll use it and twist it to my own sinister means.

As always, it is awesome to see so many positive reviews and I am glad people have enjoyed my latest efforts. Review and tell me what you think of my more serious chapter

As for the forum: http://www. fanfiction . net/myforums/Sir_Chris/804269/ (Remove spaces)