AN1: Chapter 36 is finally here, took forever to think about, a whole day to write and it's not even remotely close to huge…but don't be fooled my dear readers! Things finally start moving. I know I think I said stuff like this for too many times already but finally, things really go the way I wanted them to go, I mean, I've been meaning to let you know the stuff that's been in here for the last…5 chapters I think, or 10…something like that… and I'm finally able to let it all out and connect the dots for all to see. And um…sorry for any mistakes, dead tired here…

Thank you for staying with me through all these chapters, I hope I still can entertain you in my own way.

On with the reading:

From the last (previous) chapter:

I was tied up by its soldiers in minutes and Noah watched both me and Naruto with such sad eyes it was heartbreaking.

He couldn't cry which it was good for then, it would've made a pool at his feet which would've been seen.

I was beat up for I deserved it, apparently, or so the 'King' informed me.

And I was given like two days to live until being killed.

And when it was all over and Noah couldn't speak or do anything than stay like a ghost, for he couldn't unchain either of us.

I started screaming at Naruto.

And after I almost lost my voice, his eyelashes lifted to reveal eyes that were once blue like the sky, now, close to black.

"Brat! Finally, I was damn worried you died on me. What the hell did he do to you? No, it's not the time to talk; we need to get out of here!" Talking about escaping though in the worse shape myself, there were some hints of happiness for I really thought he's not alive anymore, he lost so much blood and I refused myself countless time to check for his pulse when I had the chance. Or just…my hands free.

"W…" His red, swollen lips started but I didn't had the patience.

"'W', what Naruto?" I asked him, still happy inside, though my happiness was as twisted as it could be.

"Who…are…y…you?" He looked at me with wide open eyes and conscious too.

All my color drained from my face.

"Who am I…brat…it's me, Rafael."

"I don't…know…you."

Slow and painful, he informed me.

And as I felt something in me break, I also heard as Noah's knees touched the cold stone of the ground.

Looking as if he's crying.

And though he had no tears, I had plenty.

And I couldn't make them stop flowing.

'He destroyed you.' I answered myself.

…

Running through the woods once again, soon looking pretty similar to the forest me and Cloud have fought into but I didn't mind it or said a word. Just ran.

Since the cat saved me and it was pretty clear I was safe with her.

I was tired soon enough while the cat looked as if she's just getting started.

Trying to inhale and exhale without coughing seemed like a futile thing to do.

So I ran and ran until she stopped.

I crashed to the ground but she immediately started mewing which was a rare thing.

I walked many steps before she finally turned around to look at me and then looked at when I am supposed to look.

Staring at a black haired man and porcelain white skin as if scattered on the ground.

"Found …you." I whispered for I couldn't believe it.

And in the same time…I had no idea what to do from now on.

The new (actual) chapter:

Everything was pure madness and nothing less. As if the cruel reality and the most painful nightmare collided in one. No one seemed whole anymore, something precious has been ripped, stolen from each one of us. And there were only two options left: fight or die.

Chapter 36: Oblivious

The scent of the dry earth beneath me seems to be stronger than before. All of my senses either came back to me or threatened to attack me, I feel both. Or maybe I'm finally dying; therefore, I'm feeling everything for one last time. I don't know with which one of these possibilities I'm more comfortable with.

"Are you…alive?" I heard a familiar voice saying these words but I didn't move. It's been such a long time since I moved an inch that I don't even recall it.

Something touched my arm and then gently pushed at it, so I'd roll over on my back. Opening my eyes, I looked at Ryuu's face and at the cat staring down at me with worry. Even the cat seemed to have a troubled expression if that's even possible.

His question finally sinks in so I replied in my mind with the ironic response: 'That's what I'm wondering myself.'

But no word left my lips; I was too focused on his eyes, trying to see what happened, trying to guess why he looks so tired, sad and afraid.

After many moments of him checking my pulse, feeling happy that I'm still alive and trying countless times to get me to speak, I finally stopped fixing my gaze on him to look at the cat itself. The cat that has been searching into my eyes just like I searched into Ryuu's eyes.

I suddenly realized that I wasn't feeling so sick anymore, that I wasn't wondering if now that I'm found, I should run or stay. Questions and decisions that haunted me for a long or a short amount of time, I couldn't tell yet. But those moments sure left invisible scars on me.

Nonetheless, in the eyes of a damned cat, I found peace.

I finally calmed down and I finally saw clearer, I finally found the strength I needed, all the strength that I still had within for at least the will to get up and speak. But I didn't. I was patient until the cat told me all that I needed to know. All that I needed to do.

As if my own wishes and my own thoughts rose up from deep within, they felt stronger and more reachable than ever. I had one goal set in mind, I had one feeling that I let to take full control of me, which is:

'Naruto. I need to rescue Naruto.'

A blind or a drunken man, that's what I've become in the hour I've walked through the forest with Ryuu and the cat behind me. No. We didn't walk, we marched. And behind this powerful thought, I knew something was wrong. This will that is my own and in the same time isn't. The determination, or yet the white page that my mind has transformed into, for I was yet to think about my actions.

And with every step that I took, I knew that something was wrong.

But I couldn't stop it for I was ordered by my own royal blood to walk, as it boiled in my veins and carried me as if in a carriage somewhere in the very forest.

A destination I didn't know about, and in my heart…I knew.

'I need to be oblivious to where I'm being taken.' I told myself.

But I wasn't.

There was a battle within me that struggled to fight back, for it knew the destination, it was what awakened my senses because I felt the ground colder, the wind whispering to me as if a spell was put on it and I was getting closer to it with every step and my body was only a tool where these battles were carried but it wasn't about me, no, it wasn't only about me.

There were so many souls involved, so many innocent lives at risk and so many who were responsible.

However, none of that could stop my legs from moving.

Not even Ryuu's scream when he spotted my red eyes but then continued to walk, ignoring and accepting them.

'We're all monsters, no one is normal here, we're all sinners, guilty for what we took and never gave back, so we must pay the consequences. Even if it's a red eye or a dead body, even if it's the blame that you couldn't save a loved one or the spirit to fight for good but being beaten down for too many times because you were always alone. We're all being punished and we know it and all of this, everything, only because…we can't forgive ourselves.'

One step, two steps and then three.

And I fell down.

On…snow.

…

"Oh, God." I exclaimed as I tried to get Naruto's King to his feet but he was stubbornly refusing to move and in the same time, he felt as heavy as a stone.

'Come on Ryuu, you can do it.' I encouraged myself as I finally moved him, helped him up and made a step.

Big mistake.

Something as lighting but much thinner erupted from his right and his left almost hit me but I also fell on my back, looking up at the strange lights that appeared from nowhere.

And then I stared down at the raven haired King which was on his knees.

Looking…destroyed.

'Something happened, I know it, and I feel it in my very core...'

But the show was over too quickly and I had to get going for the man got up on his feet in the next minute and started walking towards the castle of a man who has once been my King.

I won't lie. I hesitated for a second to go there but I had to.

Cloud has pretty much gone insane and I couldn't leave Naruto's King alone. I didn't have any other option.

Though I pitied myself in a way, not even once have I seriously considered stopping my legs from moving and going back. I continued to walk side by side with Naruto's King. As if I am his soldier. And in a way, I've become.

The thought was barely suggested by my inner self when I choose Naruto's King over the love of my life.

'Strange how things happen in life, huh…'

I already considered not writing my invitation to join into his army when the man barged into hell's castle.

'He's out of his mind.'

I blindly walked by his side and didn't realize that we were right in front of the castle until we actually got there and when he pushed the enormous doors from the entrance of it, right in front of my face, it was too late to even ask why.

I was oddly surprised and quite too unafraid when he walked all high and mighty through the dark corridors filed with the most evil people at every corner right into a certain room.

I was even more terrified when I spotted Naruto hanged by the wall along with the doctor by his side and Noah standing discouraged and with no emotion in his eyes in the middle of the room.

'This looks like…'

"Naruto…" I heard him whisper and in no minute, I faced the few soldiers of this castle at the door of this cellar, looking quite impressed or no, just angry.

"Release them." He screamed. At which, the soldiers just laughed.

I wanted to cry.

"Now!"

His voice was so different and so demanding that I would unchain them myself if I could.

The power in his voice was so strong that it was crawling underneath my skin as if making me to obey it.

I felt like his soldier in that moment.

No.

'This is the first time I feel like a soldier to someone with royal blood.'

It's true that my first 'King' had authority in his voice but it was fear that he wanted us all to feel when he ordered us.

But this person makes me feel like I want to do this, like I need to do this and not because I'm afraid of him but because he is somehow, in a way that's not humanly possible higher than me. And I don't feel like his pet. I feel like I'm nurtured, protected by his strong wing.

'And it seems…I'm not the only one.'

One of the soldiers stepped up from the crowd and went to the doctor with some keys in his hand.

And one would think that only this soldier is worthy of us, and no one else in the crowd. But no.

They may not be trying to release the two but they are standing like kids wondering who their parents are in the doorway. Massive men with black souls, guns in their hands and swords and knifes attached to their clothes. Men with no lights in their eyes, as if it's been an eternity since they last saw the sun.

The Doctor crumbled to the ground, in the arms of his King with tears that threatened to fall down from his eyes in any minute.

"Rafael, what happened? Rafael?"

A kind and caring voice replaced the other one.

"Oh, my King…it's too late. It's all been futile."

Rafael's voice was that of an old man, one filled with regrets and close to death.

"What do you mean? Why?"

"The dumb blond brat doesn't know who I am or who he is. He doesn't recognize anyone. He doesn't care to remember either. I don't know what happened to him but if what we tried to rescue has been an empty shell all along then…it's all been futile."

The King let the Doctor in my arms but both I and he watched the King as he approached Naruto, as he looked into his blue eyes.

I recognized the happiness on his features. The joy to see the man he's been given his life for and his Kingdom for. They all seemed worthless to him in the very moment.

But it all faded…in the next moment.

"Get out. I don't know you and I don't want to know you. I want to be alone."

Nothing. Nothing in Naruto's expression or voice was his anymore. It seemed like everything has been replaced with something that wanted solitude above all. Not being rescued or loved. Not even freedom was in his options. He just wanted to become one with the darkness in this room. Until his soul will leave the body.

"I am…" The King started, but was cut off.

"I don't care who you are."

"Naruto…"
"I don't know any Naruto! Stop calling me that and get out! All of you."

He'd be screaming at least but he wasn't. Even the voice didn't have any tonality. As if he doesn't care if he's not left alone either.

The wind could be blowing right or left. He seemed content with both.

He has no wishes left or …memories.

Everybody stood. The soldiers in the doorway.

The Doctor in my arms on the ground.

Noah in the middle of it all, standing like a ghost.

And the King, in front of the empty shell of Naruto, hanging on the wall, yet not released more than a hand that remained hanged in the air as if the chains were still there.

Even the soldier that stood up from its crowd and released the Doctor was now troubled if he should continue or not.

As for the King…what he's feeling or doing…I can't tell.

Even if I'm looking at his face, at his eyes and at his entire body.

There's nothing more than pain in his eyes, in his red eyes.

"Dear little brother, I will never be able to tell you how much I've missed you."

Looking at my right, in my frozen state, I witnessed the man who has once been my King. But then, something in me broke as I spotted Cloud behind him. Looking like a dog, happy to be held in a leash by his master.

'Why…?'

The King didn't turn around. He was still looking at Naruto.

But the other 'King' continued to talk.

"I however think you realize that you're now on my propriety and that you're no King, just like you never were after all. Not to mention, take responsibility for the vow and the seal that you've broken by stepping on my land, little brother."

"I know."

The voice of the royal blood returned but more tamed, calm but I had no idea why.

"First, I will take back what's mine and then I'll return to my Kingdom."

"Yes, you will do that so we will both be prepared. Equally. Since the war has started the second you set foot on my snow."

'War?'

"Second, I will have your head as ball to the children of my Kingdom!"

He screamed and finally turned around. But the other 'King' continued to have a smile on his face.

"That, we'll see little brother. If your Kingdom will still have any kids left when I finish, then I will give them your head."

"Release Naruto already!" He ordered, to which the man with the keys started to remove Naruto's chains again.

"Stop." The other King said, calm.

The man was confused, petrified in place.

"I told you I'm taking what's mine!" The King screamed at his older brother.

"My, my, but Naruto is no longer yours. He's an important part of my army now." The 'King' spoke, with the same smile present and persistent in his voice.

"Your soldier?! Ha! He's been your prisoner, but my soldier!"

"No! You can take this one," he pointed at the Doctor "but you can't take Naruto! We had a deal; he suggested it and I accepted. Because he, "the 'King' pointed at me "is alive because Naruto said he will be my soldier if I release him. And Cloud came back to me since he doesn't think of you as his King at all, just like everybody knows you're not!"

The venom in his voice, he spit it with every word. And when he finished, the smile returned.

"Go home little brother, and prepare your people, tell them to pray hard because they will die very soon and they will also serve in hell since they served you!"

Words, just words but he turned around and left the room. Cloud remained.

"We take him too." Still in my arms, the Doctor said.

"We can't…" The King whispered and turned around to look at Naruto once again. But he has long closed his eyes as if ignoring us all, or just didn't care what was happening at all and just went to sleep.

"I will escort you outside."

Cloud's voice echoed in the crowded room right into my very being, or maybe, that happened just to me.

Because everything was pure madness and nothing less. As if the cruel reality and the most painful nightmare collided in one. No one seemed whole anymore, something precious has been ripped, stolen from each one of us. And there were only two options left: fight or die.

As if in a dream, we got up from the ground and behind our real King; we walked through the dark corridors, escorted indeed, by Cloud.

It pained me to watch him with such empty eyes, wanting nothing but to see us gone.

"What happened to you, Cloud?! I don't recognize you anymore! What did he do to you…?" I cried to him as only ten steps distanced me from the snow outside.

"He offered me what you've never been able to give me."

All the color drained from my face as the huge door closed in front of me.

We walked through the snow looking pathetic. Like beaten dogs returning home with their tails between their legs. I couldn't take the silence and still, I couldn't take another word being spoken.

But after all, there was nothing left to be said.

We've been defeated.

Each one of us.

…

"What next, brats?"

I asked, hoping to break the black block of ice that stagnated too long already. We were wondering in the woods already, but sadly, not the right forest. The ground was still covered with snow and the trees were either dead or pines.

The cat was gone.

And I was honestly worried that I was the only one that noticed that.

I stopped myself from bringing that up since it would only make things worse.

I was however prepared for an ironic answer or a 'pff' sound but nothing happened, nothing was said or done. We just randomly wandered through the endless tress.

'For real Rafael, what are you expecting? These are just spoiled young brats that now think that everything is over in their life and they're just thinking of the most quick and painless way to kill themselves. '

"Brats, stop walking."

'Completely ignored.' I told myself as I was the only one that stopped.

"Stop walking!" I screamed and all I got was them turning around to look at me with the same expression Naruto had.

'What do you want? Leave me alone.' They seem to be saying.

"Look, I know you're all down now but you must be wise and go on with your head up, we aren't dead…yet, we must fight and make the best of it, we have a Kingdom to save dammit!"

"Are you really listening to yourself, Rafael?" The brat King asked me.

"Of course I am brat!"
"No, you're not. Did you see or hear anything that just happened back there?"
"I've been there brat, I remember everything perfectly."

Naruto's eyes, your eyes, Noah's eyes, Ryuu's eyes and even my own; our voices and our pain, all of these things seemed almost touchable in that damned room.

"Yet you didn't understand a single thing! We're at war, Rafael! We risked everything for Naruto! Who's not even in his right mind anymore! You said it yourself, it's all been futile!"

His face was too close to mine, all that he is emanated anger and disappointment. And behind him, Ryuu and Noah looked at the ground, at the white immaculate yet cold snow.

"No. Brat, you're the one who didn't understand anything! It doesn't matter that Naruto isn't himself anymore; all that matters is that he's alive! And that now we must save both him and your damn Kingdom, that we must return immediately and make a plan to fight back and win this war! We mustn't lose! And then we'll get Naruto back, even if we have to rewrite his whole damn blond memory, we'll take him back the way I told you to take him back in the first place! Not sneaking in secret corridors, or bowing our heads to your brother but fighting because the truth you didn't want to see brat is that your brother wants what is yours, and he took what was most important to you, he took Naruto from your Kingdom! And we must take what's ours, back! That's what I understood."

…

"Wake up, Naruto." One of the soldiers threw a bucket with dirty water in my face once again only to make sure I'm alive and I wake up and opened my eyes without even wanting.

I heard them laughing as they left the room and took their burning torch with them.

The lone source of light, now, gone.

Left only in darkness and silence. I don't hear a thing or see anything.

But I continue to search and I invent bodies and faces with the shadows of the room.

My whole body hurts and soon, my eyes start to sting from forcing them in the darkness without even letting them rest for a second.

'Weird…I thought I heard or…saw…Sasuke. It must've been my imagination.'

To be continued…

AN2: Ta da for the 36-th time! I should be named the mother of suspense ) anyway, hope you all liked it though yeah, there are also some new questions but it's inevitable! It's cause and reaction, can't be helped but at least, they are new questions, not old.

So, as always, though sad no one feels like giving them…any suggestions or questions (that can be answered) are welcomed. Feel free to ramble, I love it.

Thank you from the bottom of my heart for reading my story.

Wish you all the best and see you all next Sunday.