Last chapter of this fic, I would like to thank everyone who followed, faved and reviewed for this fic. Even though this is my first fic and it's kinda bad. I'll be editing this fic slowly over time, to make it better. But THANK YOU SO MUCH for those who were patient with my sporadic updates ^^
Sasuke: It's over... finally...
Sarada: I'm kinda sad that this series ended.
Himawari: White obaa-chan does not own Naruto! For the last time in this story! ~
Boruto: Heh...
Sarada
I sat down on the ground taking first watch. Carefully keeping my eye on the carriage holder who was seemingly sleeping, I continued to look around my surroundings for any enemy activity.
Suddenly the carriage holder sat up and looked around, I quickly feigned sleep and when I opened my eyes again, I saw him disappear in a poof of cloud. Taking his place was an light brown colored dog with a manji symbol on the middle of it's forehead.
It was holding a syringe in it's mouth, filled with purple liquid and instead of walking to Nakamura-sama he was advancing towards Papa. I pulled out a kunai carefully and sat up, I watched as the dog approach Papa and position the needle to Papa's neck.
Suddenly Papa sat up and grabbed the dog's neck and held it up. "What do you want?" He asked darkly as the dog tried to scramble away from his grip.
"I... am here to avenge... Rikuu-sama..." The dog choked out, as his eyes narrowed viciously. I ran towards Papa and picked up the syringe, before I sealed it in a medical scroll Mama gave me before.
The dog snarled and snapped, vigorously trying to wriggle out of Papa's iron grip, but to no avail. Papa's eyes narrowed and he asked icily "What is your name, and what are you to that Fujimori?"
The dog barked out a vicious laugh and snarled "The name's Manji, and I was Rikuu's partner in his chemical creations and assassination plots since he murdered the Fujimori clan." He looked arrogant and a doggish smirk lilted on the canine's lips.
Suddenly he snapped his jaws at Papa's hand and bit harshly through the glove and flesh. Papa winced but he didn't let go, Manji only smirked even more and growled "My saliva has a special chemical that can turn a person into something that looks like a spawn from hell. You won't be able to get away with it this time."
He laughed maniacally but it was cut short when I stabbed the kunai through his heart. "This is what deserve, you disgusting animal." I muttered as Papa dropped the limp dog, and focused his attention to the deep wound in his hand.
As the wind blew by, I saw the Rinnegan glimmering every time Papa's long bangs blew out of the way.
He grimaced, "Manji was telling the truth, there's a strange virus-like chakra eating its way through my body."
My eyes widened, and I replied "But you were just cured of Rikuu's curse..." This was horrible, we all worked so hard to heal Papa, but because of this stupid dog, he's turning back into a monster.
I focused my attention back to Papa, as he grunted in pain while pulling off the black fingerless glove he was currently wearing.
Stuffing it into one if his ninja pouches, he inspected the wound carefully. It was closing up, but it left a jagged black scar on his hand which was slowly creeping along his skin.
Gritting his teeth in frustration, Papa crossed his index and middle finger and created five clones. "Sarada, these will be my backup clones, one will be the replacement carriage holder and the rest will take my place if my injury worsens."
My gaze shifted to Manji's body when a trail of thick, potent chakra was absorbed into Papa's wound.
His head lifted up and it barked out a laugh, before a rough and raspy voice escaped the dead dog's mouth. "Kukukukuku... All the chakra I have stolen from hundreds of experiments, will be transferred to your body... Uchiha... Sasuke... You will... Relive... Your...pain...again."
With that the dog dropped limp again, this time truly dead, with only the stream of chakra connected to Papa's wound proving his last plot before death.
Papa grimaced as his hand was now swollen with chakra, the jagged black marks were now crawling down his fingers, leaving the affected skin rough and leathery.
"Kuso, Sarada, I'll come back after the marks cease it's movement... For now... Inform Boruto and Mitsuki about it, one of you will take double shift if I don't come back." Papa ordered, as he took hold of the dead dog and leapt away from the campsite.
I nodded and stared at the fire, sitting down quietly.
When it was Mitsuki's turn, I quickly informed him of what happened and gestured to Papa's five motionless clones. He nodded and told me to go sleep and he'll take things from here.
I slipped into my warm sleeping bag, and took off my glasses, setting them next me before I closed my eyes to sleep.
Everything was peaceful for quite awhile until someone tapped on my shoulder. Mumbling grouchily, I shifted and turned around.
An exasperated sigh was emitted behind me and the person stood up, and walked away. I opened my eyes carefully, that couldn't have been the servants or any of the people traveling with us. They were not used to ninja shifts and slept all night.
It couldn't have been Boruto or Mitsuki either, Boruto wouldn't stop poking me until I woke up and slapped him in the face. Mitsuki wouldn't wake me up either way because Boruto's shift was after his and he knew to keep his hands to himself, unless he wanted to end up like Boruto.
That only left Papa, but he left the campsite awhile ago. Turning around, I saw a blurry figure sitting next to the campfire.
Sitting up, I rubbed my eyes and searched the ground for my glasses. After putting them on, I yawned and stretched out, still drowsy from sleep.
The blurry figure was now gone and a quiet chuckle was heard behind me and someone mussed my hair slightly.
Turning around, my eyes widened when I saw what stood behind me. It was definitely Papa, but the jagged marks now covered half if his face, and his arm was completely enveloped with black.
The skin itself was rough and leathery, and his nails had curved into claws, but with half his face covered slightly with it but not fully enveloped, he looked different...
"Papa?" I mumbled, standing up only to trip on something. He steadied me and I looked away in embarrassment, earning myself an amused look. Rubbing my eyes to distract myself from the embarrassment, I blinked and yawned for a moment.
When I looked up again, Papa was staring at the crescent moon. He grimaced for a moment, as the black marks crept up his face and he closed his eyes and sighed.
"There's no point in fighting back, it's better off to just let it loose..." He muttered, and walked behind a few thick trees and underbrush.
There was no sound. Not even crickets chirping. It seemed like even the crackling fire ceased making noise.
Time began to slow, as if compared to the flowing water of a close by creek, it was the thick syrup poured on dango. Minutes turned to hours for me, and just as I thought it took forever, a rustle came from where Papa walked towards and my head snapped towards that direction.
I stopped breathing when I saw what had appeared from behind the tree. It was just like Manji had said, Papa looked like something that came from the depths of hell.
"It's that bad isn't it..." Papa murmured as he walked towards the campfire. I backed away slowly, and bit my lip.
Looking up, I saw that it was almost time for Boruto's shift, approximately 20 more minutes till he wakes up.
I looked back at Papa, his appearance was hard to describe, but what really stood out was the sickly grayish skin tone, the leathery bat-like wings that sprouted from his back and the craggy appendages that stuck out from his spine and elbows. His face had gained the features of his original curse form but his hair had stayed the same color except for the red streaks slicing through the original raven color.
His eyes were the most terrifying, it was pure blood red, not like the crimson Sharingan. And the pupil was stretched into a strange cross shape while the whites of his eyes changed to electric blue.
I had a feeling that if the saliva was extracted, he would be able to turn back to normal, but it was only a gamble.
Striding over, I took out a kunai and grabbed Papa's hand before slicing a thin cut on the craggy skin. Placing my palm on it, I injected as much chakra as I could throughout his body and knitted them together as a net and extracted it.
It wasn't too long when I got all of the liquid out but Papa stayed the same, his now puzzled expression changing to one of a grim press of his lips.
When it was Boruto's turn, he left the campsite and rested at a faraway tree. I slipped into my sleeping bag and promptly fell asleep.
Soon it was time for us to pack and leave, Papa's clones making themselves useful now.
In a blur, everything was packed up and we were ready to go. The two servants decided to position themselves next to us once again.
Activating my Sharingan, I saw that Papa trailed behind us, sprinting past the thick underbrush and trees. Shinko, confused that I had my Sharingan activated, asked "Sarada-chan, why is your eyes like that?"
I mustered up a smile and replied "It's my clan's doujutsu, it's able to copy abilities of other ninjas, track down people by their chakra and it's capable of creating powerful genjutsus. I'm just keeping track of my surroundings that's all."
Shinko nodded slightly and returned to telling me how mundane life as a servant is, but she's happy that she worked for Nakamura-sama.
This kept up for two days, where we rested and then packed again to continue traveling. Luckily no bandits nor rogue shinobi dared attack once they caught a glimpse of 'Papa'.
Papa did come out of the shadows once everyone but us were asleep. He went through defensive plans with Mitsuki and Boruto, shift after shift. Both were surprised at his new form but kept quiet.
It was then when we were just about to reach Yugakure, that he appeared. To our surprise, he was back to normal. Scanning through my thoughts, I concluded that Manji was unlike Rikuu, where Rikuu's poisons and serums were almost permanent but with a cure or antidote.
Manji's saliva or serum was one where it was temporary but it had no cure or antidote. We soon broke out if our shock and continued our travels in a happy mood.
Reaching Yugakure, Nakamura-sama thanked us and gave us rather extravagant gifts for protecting him from the fake carriage holder.
Shinko and Aki said their goodbyes and left to resume their work back at the palace. Papa had us staying behind as he talked to Nakamura-sama about future plans.
"Ne, Sarada, that was an interesting trip right?" Boruto piped up, when he became bored of waiting.
"Un, that's true... It was surprising how Papa recovered so quickly... That was very strange, I expected something much more worse to happen, but thank kami it didn't." I replied with a smile.
"Should we go through your tou-san's defensive plans again when we get back? It probably would only take us two days worth of traveling back to Konoha in the first place." Mitsuki cut in, as he stared at the entrance of the large city.
"Yeah, let's do that, Sasuke-ochan is taking FOREVER. We might as well do something for now that might help later on in our travels." Boruto agreed as he crossed his arms impatiently.
I giggled and said "Well we were supposed to travel in a certain formation, so let's start at that."
"Hah? I wanted to go over the much more important parts."
"Formation is important Boruto, Sasuke oji-san taught us that during our travels..."
"Oh be quiet, it's much more interesting in battles, but whatever..."
After Papa finished his important conversation with Nakamura-sama, we quickly set out on our way back home. Running as quickly as we all could, by the end of the day, we had made it 3/4 the way back home.
Continuing with the same shifts as we did when we first started traveling, the night passed by quickly and we got through the day quickly as yesterday. Entering through the gates we were greeted by Mama and Konohamaru-sensei.
Walking over I hugged Mama and grinned as Boruto was poking at Konohamaru-sensei. "Oi, how could you get sick on the day of the mission, Konohamaru-sensei, huh?!"
Konohamaru-sensei laughed awkwardly and sniffled a little, "Sorry guys, it was said on the mission scroll that no one on the mission was to be sick... so Naruto nii... er I mean Nanadaime-sama told me to take a day off... ehehe..."
Completely ignoring the rest of the argument, I watched as Mama grabbed Papa's hand and dragged us both home.
"Ne, Sasuke-kun, tell me about the mission... Did it turn out ok with Sarada-chan?" Mama asked curiously as Papa continued to allow himself to be dragged away by her.
Papa said nothing and until we got home, he spoke up. Not wanting to hear what happened again, I rushed towards Itachi oji-san who was sitting at a tree trunk concentrating on meditating.
"Itachi oji-san!" I called out and stopped when Itachi oji-san opened his eyes and walked towards me. He mussed my hair and smiled slightly "So... You're back? How was the mission?"
I sweatdropped "I prefer, not to talk about it. You could ask Papa though... he's telling Mama about it right now." Itachi oji-san smirked and shook his head, "It's fine, he's going to end up glaring at me anyways..."
Suddenly Obaa-sama's head poked out the door and she called out "Lunch is ready! Come in and eat!" Then she disappeared back in the house.
I smiled and pulled Itachi oji-san into the house. Looking at everyone seated at the table, I beamed.
Life is finally back to normal.
Owari
This ending feels so rushed... but I'll fix it in the future :3 (I'll be sure to put an Edited sign at every chapter I edited) THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR THOSE WHO REVIEWED AND FAV/FOLLOWED. Be sure to check out my new story "We Meet Again" Which will be posted either after this story or the next day.
Sasuke: It's over... thank kami
Sarada: I'm kinda sad, but let's say our goodbyes to everyone *smiles*
Everyone: Thank you for reading this and supporting the author! Please R&R and for the final time! Ja!
Naruto: Ja matta Minna!
White: Owari *smirks*