Following up from last chapter...

Without further ado, I sort of trapped myself with the name of that last one.

Chapter 52: To Worse

Naruto hung his head for a moment, relief coursing through his body like a tidal wave, crashing out through his mouth as a gasping breath. He looked back up at Sasuke and Sakura standing in front of him, both smirking, as if sharing in some kind of inside joke.

He got the feeling the joke was the face he was making, which must've looked positively ridiculous.

He didn't much care.

He shot forward, wrapping the both of them in a bone-shattering hug that threatened to do just that. The two leaf Genin gave him the same treatment, and he was fairly sure they would've killed him if not for the Nine-Tails'-shaped battery in his stomach.

"You're okay!" He nearly shouted as he broke apart from them, finding a smile on his face that was so wide it almost hurt. "I was… Haaah…" he gasped in relief once more, placing his left hand over his heart in an effort to steady himself. "I was so worried."

His teammates laughed at him, but there was no malice in their voices. If anything, they sounded quite reassured themselves, the knowledge that he somehow hadn't changed at all a comforting fact. It would've been an absolutely foolish concern for anyone else, but he'd had very similar anxieties, given they'd been captured by Orochimaru of all people. He'd thought the snake might do something to them, change them in some way…

He looked towards Sakura's skin, an odd shade of purple that was almost gray, and her hair, now a slightly pinkish-white that hung almost to her knees, and couldn't help but feel a small chill shoot up his spine. The sclera of her eyes were a solid black, as well, reflecting just enough light for them to be seen as inhuman. It clashed horridly with her green pupils, which he couldn't quite read. It was almost as if the transformation she'd taken on, whatever it was, concealed her emotions.

I shouldn't get ahead of myself. Naruto snapped himself out of his dark thoughts, forcing his mind to focus on the two before him. I'll ask Sakura what's going on. If I can't trust her to answer me honestly, then what am I doing calling myself her friend?

That seemed to be put on hold for the moment, however, for it was now Anko's turn to do the hugging. She pounced on the normally pink haired kunoichi, swinging her slightly from side-to-side and causing the girl in her arms to groan a bit uncharacteristically.

"Thank everything you're okay." Anko whispered into the crook of Sakura's neck, just loud enough that Naruto could barely pick it up. "If I'd lost you, I don't…"

Sakura's expression softened almost immediately, a bit like she was only just remembering who it was had a hold of her. Naruto found that quite worrying, swallowing on nothing as he made to stand, but once more, he wasn't able to find the time to ask the girl anything.

"I'd really like to spend more time catching up, but right now, we need to be worrying about getting out of here." Anko spoke, pulling herself away from Sakura and turning back towards the group. "We can save our questions for later, yeah?"

Everyone nodded, including Zaku, who seemed a bit miffed he hadn't gotten to say his piece to Sakura.

Or he's miffed about the way she and Sasuke keep giving each other that look. Naruto found some small semblance of amusement in the sound ninja's frustration, even if it was a bit sad. Sorry, Zaku. You didn't really have a chance, dude.

His teammates, Dosu and Kin, who were standing a few paces behind him, wore expressions largely similar to Naruto's own. Clearly the boy's crush was an open secret.

And one they knew was rather doomed.

Kiba walked in front of the group, leading with his puppies help, and Anko signaled for them all to follow him. Akamaru chirped up as well, giving a rather chipper 'yip!' that seemed a bit at odds with the mechanical corpse still lain a few feet from them. Naruto looked towards it with muddy emotions.

Luckily, it seemed the creature before them hadn't exactly possessed any feelings or emotions, for even as it had been destroyed, the perpetual smile on its face had never left. Now, its face was strewn around the room in multiple pieces, having housed more of a core than a brain, which Naruto could say he was thankful for. It wouldn't have felt good to see Sakura kill someone, even if they had been Akatsuki.

That was a scary prospect for what he hoped was another day. As ninja, he didn't doubt they'd have to dirty their hands at some point, but he hoped it was rather far in the future. Perhaps that was an overly naïve dream, but it was one he'd hold to.

They walked for a while, coming across a few hallways that Sasuke and Sakura told them were dead ends. After perhaps fifteen minutes, they came upon a collapsed tunnel, which the two then explained led to an odd site.

"There was a way out from there." Sasuke explained, placing his hand on the fallen dirt and lamenting silently. "But it's being guarded by what we think is an Akatsuki member. He was riding on a weird bird, and he used long-range explosives on the both of us. It was close, but we managed to get away. Unfortunately, we caved in the path as we came back out."

Naruto nodded, getting the idea, even if it was a bit depressing to think they could've had sweet freedom, if not for some less than stellar luck.

I'm really growing tired of being stuck in here. Naruto deadpanned, holding back a groan as they turned around and took another path. Does anyone even know how long we've been stuck in here?

Days? Weeks? Honestly, someone could've told him he'd been in there for his entire life, and he'd have been half-tempted to believe them.

He flinched as the walls around them shuddered slightly, a distant explosion seemingly rocking its way through the bunker. He braced himself against the wall beside him, expecting another to follow suit in the next few moments, but nothing came.

A tired sigh fell limply from his mouth. The worry building in the core of his stomach grew only more intense as they came across another collapsed path, though this one seemed to have been broken intentionally, as there were still scorch marks around the edges of the cave-in, as if a targeted blast had broken the ceiling above them.

"Are…" Naruto gulped, trying his very best to not panic. "Are they trying to seal us down here?"

There was a small flick on the back of his forehead, and when he turned around, he was face to face with an annoyed looking Anko, her arms crossed beneath her breasts.

"Assuming the worst now, are we?"

"Er…"

"Don't panic." She rebuked him, but the corners of her mouth turned up a moment later. "C'mon, you're supposed to be the hopelessly optimistic one. What are we going to do if you're down and out, huh?"

He grumbled under his breath, not exactly feeling terribly confident at that moment, before he peered up at Sasuke and Sakura, who were gazing a bit expectantly at him. He realized then and there that the woman wasn't exactly wrong. It wasn't quite a need for him to be the positive one, but the groups morale did, undoubtedly, hang on his own vigor.

I need to be strong. He put together a moment later, taking a long and aching breath and plastering a toothy grin onto his face. If not for me, then for everyone else.

It wasn't exactly fair to have such expectations placed upon him… but life had an odd habit of kicking Naruto in the ass, so he was sort of used to it by now. Besides, to keep his friends happy…

It was a small price to pay.

"You're right!" He shouted out, turning back around, and walking towards another pathway, one which would, hopefully, lead them out of this underground prison. "This is no time to be sitting around moping!"

"Well, I wasn't asking for that much energy, but I respect that you went for it." Anko joked, laughing slightly to herself as she stepped in front of him, marking the path they'd just taken with an 'x' on the wall. "Alright, we'll keep moving, then. Everyone, stay close."

"We don't want to get mixed up in here…"

/-/

Sasuke really did appreciate his friends spirit, but that didn't mean he was having a better time than he had been a few minutes prior.

Largely because they were still stuck down here, his brother was here, just moving around freely, Sakura was still a total enigma, given that he wasn't sure how much her curse mark was affecting her, and there could be another member of the Akatsuki around any corner, just waiting to kill all of them.

It was a hell of a lot of fun, being down in these tunnels, stuck with his thoughts.

They made it to another crossroads, resulting in just about every one of them letting out an exasperated sigh. It felt like this entire place had been designed with confusion in mind, as if the architect himself were laughing at each and every one of them whenever they got lost for the umpteenth time.

"Kiba, you smelling anything?"

The young beast-master furrowed his brow, and Sasuke got the impression that something was worrying him.

"Yeah, but I'm not sure how helpful it'd be."

"That's fine. Anything's better than nothing at this point."

"Guess that's fair." Kiba reasoned. "Well, Akamaru's having problems getting the smell of the outside because, like I said earlier, he's pretty overwhelmed. That said, he thinks… and I'm not able to confirm this, since my nose is just as bad right now, but he thinks it's going to be more northwest than northeast."

Kiba walked up towards the maze of pathways before them, and pointed to the ones more off to his left

"If we can, we should try and stick to the western halls. That's at least where Akamaru says the smell seems to be coming from."

Anko followed the boys advice, taking the middle-most western path.

Once more, they encountered no one.

At this point, things were beginning to make a bit more sense for Sasuke. Evidently, the soldiers around here had already gone to try and defend Orochimaru's position, wherever the hell that was, and didn't have time to be dealing with the escape of some random Genin. Even Orochimaru himself probably had bigger things to be worrying about.

Likely not dying.

Still, they did encounter the occasional corpse left on the side of the path, or, in the case of the one just before them, directly before them.

"Huh." Dosu spoke out a bit quietly, sounding almost… sad. "I knew this guy. He was one of the cafeteria workers. Well, working here, he was a ninja too, but… he used to give me an extra helping of whatever I asked for."

Zaku patted his teammate on the shoulder, trying to cheer him up a bit, but it seemed as if Dosu was quite good at dealing with his emotions, for he took a deep breath and soldiered forward, as if he hadn't seen a thing.

Sasuke could respect the boy's resolve. If he were to mourn the man, he'd do it later. Though, to be fair, Sasuke had the feeling the sound ninja would forget the body they'd passed by within the day.

That seemed awfully cold to Sasuke. Especially with how he'd been feeling since he'd encountered his brother again, back when they'd fought in the hallway of that hotel. He'd been reminded then that he wanted his friends to help keep him out of the darkness…

He'd been reminded they truly were the most important people in the world to him.

He zoned out as they traveled through the hallways, and subconsciously, he found himself walking side-by-side with Naruto. He wasn't sure why, at first, but a small voice seemed to call out from the back of his mind, proclaiming that he knew exactly what he was doing.

He'd found an answer to what Naruto had asked of him all that time ago.

I'm still trying to find my own reason to live my life… One that isn't just for you guys… Or for my family's legacy… but I promise… I promise I'll try and find that, too

It wasn't perfect, and he was fairly sure the boy beside him would call him out on such, but he didn't much care. He was going to tell Naruto what he felt, and he held it in good faith that he would accept that.

Naruto was his best friend, after all.

He lightly tapped the Jinchuuriki on the shoulder, before, a second later, he realized he should probably let Sakura in on this as well. The girl jumped slightly as he made contact, having apparently been in her own little world, but she turned back with a curious expression, looking towards the two of them questioningly.

"Uhm…" He began a bit awkwardly, finding a nervous sort of energy pervading his chest. "There's something I need to tell Naruto, but I felt like you should hear it too, so…"

Sakura tilted her head to the side but nodded a moment later, seemingly uncaring.

They hung back just a little from the rest of the group, a few feet, but even that was enough for Kiba and the Sound trio to shoot them odd looks. He ignored them, turning towards Naruto, and taking a deep breath.

"I've got my answer."

Naruto reacted almost instantly, his eyes widening as a small smile threatened to overtake his face. It played with the corners of his mouth, even as he fought to keep it under control. Sakura, for her part, seemed confused, which Sasuke thought was fair, given that she hadn't been present for his and Naruto's initial talk.

"Let's hear it, then." Naruto sounded supportive as they rounded a corner, and continued down what was an almost identical passageway.

"I…" He worked up the nerve. "I've decided that I'm going to live to protect all of you."

Naruto's excitement faded slowly, being replaced instead with an inquisitive expression, which seemed like it could easily transition into an annoyed one at the drop of a hat.

"Just curious," The Jinchuuriki started. "How is that any different than living for us? Because the whole point was that you'd find a reason to live for yourself, not for us."

"I know." Sasuke shook his head, trying to explain it a bit better this time. "It's not some grand answer, I know, but… I'm not living vicariously anymore. I'm not just going to fade away or… or die. I'm going to stick around and protect all of you. I'm going to keep you all safe. That's my dream."

Naruto squinted once more.

"Right. I hear you. What I'm saying is this sounds an awful lot like living for us." Naruto tried to fire back at him. "You're placing your own life under less importance. You throwing it away for us, instead of throwing it away on a whim, is no better!"

"I'm not throwing my life away."

"Huh?"

"I'm not devaluing my life." Sasuke reassured his best friend, trying to convey his sincerity with his expression. "I've been thinking while I was down here… About you, and Sakura, and Kakashi and Ino and everyone else waiting for us back in the village. I've decided that… I won't let any of you get hurt. But, I knew that wouldn't be enough for you, because that would just be me throwing myself in front of them, as a human shield."

"No better than before." Naruto followed along. "So, you're saying it's different?"

Sasuke nodded once more.

"I'm not going to throw away my life, because I know my life's important for protecting you all." He explained, ignoring the way Naruto's brow furrowed slightly. "If I were to die, then I couldn't count on anyone else in the village to keep you guys safe like I can, so, naturally, I can't die."

Naruto opened and closed his mouth, as if still disagreeing with him on the nature of his 'answer'. Sakura, on the other hand, gave a smirk as she bumped his shoulder with her own.

"Well, well, well." The girl chimed in for the first time in a while, seemingly zoning back into the world as she listened to them talk. "Consider me protected."

He wasn't sure if the girl was just a bit more forward than she'd normally be, but he found himself blushing slightly at her comment, despite there being only a very subtle undertone that he definitely had to reach for to catch.

"Hold it!" Naruto cut back in. "I'm still not convinced! This is just your old 'answer' with extra steps!"

"Well, it's not perfect, I'll admit that." Sasuke confessed, looking over towards his best friend and meeting his gaze seriously. "But I'm not going to stop there, either. I… I'll keep improving my 'answer', until it really is as good as it can be."

Naruto's eyes relaxed ever so slightly, and he saw in the boy's expression the first signs of him coming to terms with the things Sasuke had said. It would be a gradual process, that he already knew, but with the way the hyperactive blonde cared about him, not to mention Sakura behind him…

He couldn't betray their trust. And that meant he had to be honest with them, too.

"I…" He steeled his nerve. "I'm not going to give up on killing Itachi. I can't do that, and-"

"We know."

He turned towards Naruto, seeing the unsurprised but sad look on his face, and then to Sakura, seeing her visage much the same.

"We know how much all of that means to you. I… no, we won't ask you to stop, but…" Naruto took a shaky breath, as if he himself were steeling his nerves to say something he'd been holding back. "When you face him, and you will… let us come too."

It was Sasuke's turn to be shocked now. He looked the both of them in the eye and saw the resolve they held there. Clearly, this had been a talking point between the two of them for a very long while, one they'd been horribly nervous about approaching him with.

They must've thought he'd turn them down outright, and to be fair to them, the urge to do just that was the first thing that came over him. Hell, a month or two ago, he was fairly sure that would've come blazing out of his lips without a second thought…

But if he was asking them to trust him…

"Alright." He muttered quietly, awkwardly rubbing at the back of his neck. "I… That seems more than fair."

The two looked positively flabbergasted, evidently having expected him to put up a fierce resistance, before they let out titanic breaths. They sounded incredibly relieved as they reached over and brought him into an unwieldy, mid-walk hug, one which he fought against with every fiber of his being.

Unfortunately, by the time he was able to shake them off, they'd already finished, laughing to themselves a bit giddily as they looked up at him.

"And, well…" Sasuke blushed a bit more fiercely this time, purposefully avoiding eye-contact with Sakura. "I genuinely would like to repopulate my clan as well. But that's a bit farther off, and larger in scope."

"And you'd need some help." The younger kunoichi pointed out, though there was a playful twinge at the back of her throat that had a knot forming in Sasuke's stomach. "Well, let me know if you're looking for volunteers."

Sasuke coughed violently, practically losing himself in the burning sensation taking over his face. Naruto, for his part, looked much the same, hiding the blush on his cheeks with one of his hands as he took a few steps to the left, now as far from the two of them as he could be in the narrow corridor.

"W-w-what the hell!?" The boy shouted. "W-when did you get so aggressive, Sakura!?"

Sasuke could admit to wanting to know that himself, but when he tried to ask, he found his throat clamming up.

"What are you talking about?" Sakura asked, flicking some of her new longer hair out of her face. "I'm always like this."

"You're not." Naruto refuted.

She isn't. Sasuke agreed mentally.

Sakura shrugged, evidently not caring very much what they thought of her. He watched as, a moment later, the girl's eyes glazed over slightly, as if she'd gone to her own little world. He reached over quite gingerly, his face still aflame with embarrassment, and lightly brushed her shoulder, watching as she snapped back to reality.

"S-sorry." She spoke quietly, rubbing the back of her neck with one hand. "Curse marks being weird."

Well that'd certainly explain this recent conversation.

It was yet another part of this curse mark that he didn't like. Evidently, the moment they got back to the village, Sasuke, Naruto, and Anko were hauling the girl in for testing, whether she liked it or not, but that didn't mean they should ignore it now if it was going to be toying with her normal emotions and behaviors.

"Sakura?" He decided he'd do this now, stepping just a bit in front of her so he could see the whole of her face while they walked. "Are you feeling alright?"

"Well, I'm certainly not perfect, but I'm doing fine, sort of."

Less to go off of than I was hoping for.

"I think Sasuke's trying to ask how your curse marks affecting you without actually asking it." Naruto summarized with a coy smile, teasing him just a bit. "You could always just say what you want to, y'know?"

"Shut up…" He muttered under his breath. "But… yeah, he's not wrong, I guess. Is your curse mark… doing anything to you?"

Sakura seemed to considered that for a moment as they stepped into another large area, one which looked to have seen a battle fairly recently, if the scratches along the wall and missing chunks of the floor were anything to go by.

"I… yeah." Their teammate admitted after some time, looking up at them with a sad smile on her face. "Honestly, I'm losing it, just a little bit."

His eyes widened as she averted her gaze from their own, staring down at the chipped floor below her as they crossed through the makeshift battlefield, and into another hall on the opposite side.

"I can't really describe it, but… Just keep talking, okay?"

"Huh?" Naruto asked her, re-approaching the two of them now that their 'flirting' was over. "Sakura, what do you mean?"

"Right now, I… I think the only thing that's keeping me present is the sound of your voices." She looked to the both of them, an awkward plea hanging in her eyes. "Please, just… stay by me, and don't let me forget who you are… or who I am, ok?"

Sasuke felt a core of dread building in his throat, but he swallowed it, focusing instead on the raw desire to keep the girl safe that was practically boiling along inside him.

"Okay." He promised her. "We won't let you lose yourself."

The girl smiled, despite the sadness lurking behind her gaze. He tried to ignore it as well, but it haunted him just a bit too much for it to quite be left behind.

"Hey, we found one!"

They turned towards the front of the group, where Kiba was stood before a staircase. Akamaru barked happily on his head, and from the reaction, Sasuke could tell just what it was they'd discovered.

"A passage up!?"

The sole member of Team 8 nodded, an animalistic smirk encompassing his veneer.

"Whew." Anko blew some air out of her mouth, stepping in front of the dog-lover and patting both he and Akamaru on the top of their heads, though she took a second longer to lightly scratch the puppy under his chin. "I was beginning to get a tad concerned. Alright, we're going up, so don't dawdle behind, you three."

Sasuke smiled as the rest of the group had a laugh at their expense. He knew it was good-natured, as did Naruto and Sakura. The former snickered, though the latter only placed a hand in front of her mouth, feigning a laugh as they continued walking along.

Sasuke didn't like it, not one bit, but he couldn't do anything about it, not now. Instead, he focused on what he could do. He nudged both of his best friends on their shoulders and asked a rather simple question as they turned to meet him.

"What should we talk about?"

/-/

Orochimaru grabbed the last of the documents sitting upon the table before him, and, with nary a thought, set them aflame.

He was standing in his main laboratory, alongside numerous bodies, papers, and experiments. Hanging along the walls were the remains of tens, perhaps hundreds of people, all aiding him in unlocking the secrets of immortality, secrets which were written down on pages and pages of work that had taken him half a century to amass.

And he was content to destroy them all.

If they were coming for him, then he wasn't going to let them have his life's work for free.

He burned discovery after discovery, subject after subject, and even his more recent research, focused on trying to undo the reaper death seal.

Especially that. He had a theory, now, about just what it was the Akatsuki might be trying to accomplish. It was a long-shot, and perhaps giving the bastards a bit too much credit…

But best not to take any chances.

He heard the sound of someone entering the room, and didn't even bother turning to meet them. The Akatuski weren't the type to kill him while his back was turned, even if they might've with anyone else. He, however, was a traitor to their ranks, and so he'd earned their ire, ire enough that they'd want him to know just who it was had killed him.

He could respect that.

"Ah! Orochimaru, hi there!"

He let out a small groan as he heard the voice of the man he'd least wanted to encounter today. He turned, looking into the black hole of Tobi's right eye, and trying not to give anything away on his face.

He threw the flaming scroll in his hands at the masked man and watched with some small amusement as it passed right through him, crumpling entirely to ash as it hit the ground.

"How mean, Oro!" The man-child complained, shaking his fists up in down in an incredibly annoying manner. "You know I've never been very good at playing catch!"

"Drop the act. It's never deceived me, and I grow quite tired of it."

The assailant before him halted, letting his hands fall back to their normal positions and letting out a sigh. He looked up towards Orochimaru, and barely, if the dim light of his laboratory hit the man's mask just right, he thought he could see the eye inside. It did not regard him playfully, as one might've expected from Tobi's persona, but instead with a cold seriousness.

Ah. Orochimaru's face split open, revealing teeth beneath that could've cut into the man's neck, if not for his special ability. So this is your true self.

How interesting.

"Are you sure?" Tobi's voice changed altogether, and as he stepped forward, his walking was inaudible on the tile below him. "Most people who've said that find they quite prefer 'Tobi', in the end."

Orochimaru smirked.

He unhinged his jaw, and felt the hilt of his Kusanagi blade rise out from his stomach. He drew it, and wielded it in his bodies new right hand. Already, the form of the prisoner he'd absorbed was changing back into his own. The man's spiky white hair was already becoming straight and long, flowing to the bottom of his neck, and his mouth and nose were conforming to their old shape.

The man's form was, at least, useful for regaining some control over his arms. He still could not utilize Jutsu, but he was able to wield the blade in his right hand with a practiced ease.

Tobi, however, seemed unimpressed.

"Is that all?" The man's gravely voice asked him, tilting his head slightly as if disappointed. "Well, I suppose that's fine. It's not like it matters too terribly much."

Tobi reached up towards his mask, and Orochimaru realized with some degree of shock that he was about to remove it. His fingers touched the material, made solid contact…

And Orochimaru was upon him.

He blitzed forward in a few milliseconds, his sword cutting through where the man had just been. Like he'd thought, however, Tobi's true self was that of a seasoned and experienced ninja.

He'd have had to be, Orochimaru knew, to take on Minato all those years ago.

The battle was short. Without any of his Jutsu, including, perhaps most importantly, the Reanimation Jutsu, he was a shadow of his former self, and certainly not equipped to be fighting a ninja who might just be higher than the rank 'S'.

He skittered to the floor, finding himself knocked back, looking up at Tobi a few meters away from him. He stood victoriously, not an ounce of doubt in his features. Clearly, he knew of Orochimaru's weakness, of what the Third had taken from him.

"You shouldn't interrupt, Orochimaru." The man told him, a bit of his Tobi persona sinking into his voice. "It's awfully rude."

He reached up to his mask once more, clicking it in and pulling out. The orange, spiraling porcelain was removed, and the man beneath was revealed. To Orochimaru's immense shock, he actually recognized the features below it.

From it blossomed a memory he'd honestly forgotten he had. He'd spied upon Minato all those years ago, trying to figure out what would make him a superior candidate to him to be chosen for the position of fourth Hokage. In his anger, he'd even thought about taking one of the Flash's pupils and using them as a test experiment. Purely out of rage and spite, at first, but then, when he'd realized the soon-to-be-Hokage had an Uchiha under his tutelage…

Orochimaru let out an almost manic cackle, putting the pieces together even as the unmasked ninja before him stepped closer, coming for what he could only assume was the finishing blow.

So… that's how it is…

The Uchiha under the man had not had his Sharingan unlocked when he'd gone to kidnap him, and so he had, with some annoyance, let the boy live. There'd been no reason to think he'd ever be anything more than a black sheep of the Uchiha clan, after all, there were many Uchiha who never even unlocked their Sharingan to begin with.

"To think you of all people would betray the Leaf Village…" He felt another bout of laughter bubbling up from within him, but suppressed it. "You, who clamored on and on about becoming Hokage, while living in the shadow of another."

The enigma before him said nothing, stepping forward and opening his left eye.

"To think it'd be you…" He uttered past his teeth. "Obito Uchiha."

"So… you know of that name." The former leaf ninja confirmed, unfeeling. "Hm. Not like it matters."

The Sharingan in his left eye spun again, forming into a Mangekyou that Orochimaru had never seen…

So… that Danzo really was holding out on me. Orochimaru realized, finding the man's treachery almost entertaining. You trusted no one to the bitter end… and look where it got the both of us.

"Tell me, Obito," Orochimaru mocked the man's identity, but silently wondered if he would fulfill his endless quest for knowledge. "Just how did you survive?"

"Since you've seen my face and know of my identity" Obito continued, completely ignoring him. "I'm afraid I'm the last person you'll ever get to see. But first," The man's left eye bled slightly, a single bead of red rolling down his cheek, like a tear. "You will tell me… everything."

Orochimaru knew not what was coming, but he had an almost vague idea. If this was what the Akatsuki had gained from killing Danzo, then it had to have been his trump card. And the trump card of a man who'd played his cards that close to his chest…

Was nothing to be trifled with.

"Kotoamatsukami."

End Chapter 52

Yesterday, while I was supposed to be finishing and editing this chapter, I instead played Persona 5 The Royal for approximately 8 hours.

I do need like... some help.

Getting pretty close to the end of this arc. Letting everyone know that once it's over, this story will take a couple week-to-month long break while I plan the next couple of arcs.

Not quite yet, though. You've still got weekly updates for a bit!

On that note, see you all next week!