Notice: I do not own Naruto, and make no claims of copyright on the
characters who are not my property. Original characters, however, are mine.
Author's Notes: I'm keeping the pace, so here's the new chapter, and finally the resolution to the current problem, and enough violence that I've finally caved and upgraded the rating to R, something I dislike doing, but I suppose it is necessary for this and some of what is to come, considering the apparent sensitivity of FF.net.
As a side note, I finally managed to see the Jump Festa 2004, and it appears that this story conflicts with the Naruto course not in the main plotline, but in my creation of Hidden Waterfall. Frankly, I think my Mizuho wielding borderline psychos who had the guts to take Xi on are a lot better than those portrayed in the OVA, I mean, could they have created a village that was more pathetic? Naruto and Sasuke could have conquered the whole place.
Whatever, enjoy and please review!
The Dragon's Wrath
In the depths of night, with the crescent moon high in a sky filled with scattered clouds Neji decides it is time. I am going to get Shiren back now. He thought as he stood up slowly. As he moved slowly, behind the shelter of the small tree, working out the tensions in his muscles that had built up from lying on the ground for hours. Neji's mind crystallized around the plan he had formed. It was very simple, as he had told Dar before, and yet it would require the full use of his powers. I will need speed to match anything I have ever seen for this to work. Neji knew. Yet, there is a way. All it took was the memory of Shiren's face to remove any doubts from Neji's mind about what he must do.
The only jutsu that can destroy Tonetero is dragon breath. Neji had realized that since even before the flight from that battle had finished. At first it had made him hopeless, since he had never completed the move, but now it was comforting. Though Neji had no idea how he would approach fighting Tonetero when he reached him, he knew what the final move must be, the only move that would matter.
Dar stood up beside him, likewise stretching his muscles for readiness, and repositioning his sword on his belt, able to draw that crystalline weapon whenever he needed.
A quick glance at the stone ninja recalled the assumptions Neji had made about him. It was strange, but he found he trusted Dar, even though he had met the ninja really only a day before. He is like Gosain, Neji decided, recognizing that he had already begun to think of the two ninja in the same way. They are similar, but there are differences, and Dar is a dragon ninja, or will be. He is reliable for this. There was only one fear Neji had about Dar now. He is quick, but I wonder if he can keep up.
"Dar, it's time." Neji told him.
Dar shrugged, staying silent.
Neji looked away from the stone ninja, and down toward the distant fort. Four kilometers, that is the distance. They will certainly detect us when we get within three, if not before. They must not have any time to react. Neji placed his hands together, forming a single seal, one known to every ninja, Ryu, the dragon. He held the seal for a long time, focusing his mind, but doing nothing with chakra, instead he pushed all thought of that power away, for this technique was nothing of chakra. Instead he called two images into his mind. The first was of Shiren, missing, captive, taken from him. Neji had never been able to do this technique before, and he knew that there were two reasons. One was his failure to be a dragon ninja, a failure to recognize the killing spirit in him, and the second was the lack of a sufficient focus. Tonetero has given me one, and it will be his death. Neji felt his anger and hatred boil up, and he gathered it to him, pushing it slowly out of his mind, focusing it into all parts of him, dispersing that anger under the cold killing vision of a dragon ninja, letting it soak into every bit of him, so that it was fully part of him. Then Neji called up the second image, the image of Wusashu that he had long tried to forget, of the dragon's absolute rage when he obliterated Mizain Seve, the destructive fury of those alien eyes, completely without mercy and drawing upon a reserve of power that it seemed no body could contain.
Neji's hands moved, the seal folding in and slamming his knuckles together with a crack. "Dragon's Wrath." He whispered in a voice that was not his own, but seemed to come from some other place, well beyond him.
Dar, watching the motion, could not see the hands move, and he wondered what happened.
For Neji the world seemed to shift into slow motion around him, and everything went absolutely crystal clear. He could feel and detect precisely how much strength and energy he had, and he could feel it begging for release, his body burned with the energy it had unleashed within itself.
"Dar, run as fast as you can." Neji told him.
"What?" Dar asked, confusion in his voice.
Neji's hand whipped down, grabbing the nekode from his legs and lifting them back up.
Dar blinked, and then again. The nekode had just materialized on Neji's hands. Dar recognized that he must have reached down and grabbed them, but that wasn't possible. No human can move that fast, even with chakra, the nerves can't move that fast, they can't!
Neji took a step forward, and then he ran.
To Dar it appeared as a white and tan blur advancing in the darkness, as he desperately started to run to catch up. The Stone ninja had never seen anything like that, except the movements of the dragon, Sirachi, the day before.
Dragon's Wrath, Neji recalled Xi's explanation silently as he dashed forward, pushing his newfound speed to the utmost. The move was like Lotus in many ways, and yet it was different. Lotus increased the power and demand placed on the muscles, overriding the brain's restrictions. Dragon's Wrath went beyond that. It did not affect the muscles, but the nerves. There is a limit to the speed of human nerves, one not even chakra can overcome, an absolute upper maximum that certain ninja, such as Uchiha Itachi, might reach during their lifetimes. There is no earthly way past that limit, Xi had told Neji, but the anger of a dragon is not a thing of this world, and neither is the essence of a human who can break through all barriers. If you summon the Dragon's Wrath the only limit to the speed and power of your reactions if your own will, the very speed of your thoughts.
Like Lotus, this incredibly powerful technique had a price, this exertion of anger made one with the power to strike. Once exhausted the user could do nothing, not even move, until rested, and even then it would take some time for the body to recover, but that was not the greatest danger. The greatest danger was to lose control during wrath, for without the limitations of the nerves, a ninja could easily move so fast and strong as to rip their own body apart. "Therefore, you must use this only when absolutely necessary." Xi had told Neji.
Now is such a time. I will get Shiren back from you Tonetero, or I will die in the attempt! Neji swore.
The land flew by in Neji's sight, the Byakugan already enveloping his eyes. He saw the wall, his objective, and how far he had to travel to reach it. He slashed over the ground then, terrifyingly quick, blasting past the maximum speed of a human, to reach the speed of a running cat across the plains, a creature of the air and the earth.
The grass ninja saw this streak, and heard the screaming sound Neji's advance made across the scrubland. Grass ninja ran to the wall, grabbing for their weapons and reaching the position, considering what they could do.
It was too late. "Too slow!" Neji thundered, leaping into the air to cover the last segment like a launched missile. He saw the grass ninja raise weapons or form seals in the beginnings of a counterattack, but it was all too late. Nekode outreached, and Neji reached the wall.
"Rend!" It was like the impact of some hellish weapon from a world not yet made, as if a great bird had slammed down from the heavens to hit the wooden wall.
The wall burst apart, flinging ninja and fragments of wood everywhere, mingling both together, so that ninja screamed and died as great shards of wood slashed through their bodies. Ten ninja removed from the opposition before they had time to even strike.
Yet Neji was not done. Even as Tonetero's head turned and he saw exactly what had happened, shock breaking out over his face, Neji was already moving.
Two grass ninja stood between him and the building Tonetero stood upon.
Neji slashed through them, moving his arms around their weapons, will and chakra guiding his movements, under and over swords, to bring nekode through the vulnerable points, leaving them behind before they even had time to realize they were dead.
As Neji landed in front of him, Tonetero turned fully to face the dragon ninja. "You!" He hissed. "You dare!" Thorns whirled around him like a great swarm of brown knives. "Kill him you fools!"
The seven grass ninja who yet stood in the compound hesitated for a moment. Their faces were torn, did they attack this ninja who had just slain half of them, this specter who moved like a monster and not a man, or did they disobey the true monster, the one who could not die. Though they hesitated, they were about the first took a step toward Neji, the madness in Tonetero's eyes having decided them.
"You have other concerns!" That came from the voice of Kataishi Dar, whose crystalline blade shattered the katana one of the men held and then slashed a horrid gash into his side. The remaining grass ninja, seeing this enemy, a dangerous man to be sure, but one they could fight, turned to face him.
"You traitors!" Tonetero howled, then his head jerked around in fear.
"Clawing Whirlwind!" Neji's lethal spin impacted upon that screen of thorns, slashing and clawing, slicing the wooden spikes into diced pieces. When the move completed the screen of thorns lay broken upon the rooftop. "You should be concerned for yourself." Neji said through eyes empty of any feeling. This was not even killing, it was the destruction of a thing that should already have been dead, one that had dared to attack him and imprison Shiren.
Tonetero slid back swiftly, bringing his hands together. "We build things from wood here!" He shouted back. The roof cracked under his feet, and a new storm of thorns, including many pieces of the old rose up around him.
Damn! Neji thought. There must be a way to penetrate that wall of thorns. As long as it is up he will dodge away from dragon breath as he did with Xi.
"It is useless." Tonetero laughed, and a stream of wooden missiles launched themselves at Neji.
They would have seemed fast as arrows from a bow had a normal person been watching, and they came in from all sides.
Neji simply raised his hands, and his motion blurred, in a moment all the thorns crashed to the ground, crushed.
Tonetero's eyes went wide, and the shock in him was clear. Yet the dead man was beyond fear, fully in the throes of the madness of Edo Tensei, the instability that encompassed a psyche allowed free reign after returning from death. He readied to attack again.
There must be a way! Neji thought, even as he saw Dar spin and fall back from the assault of grass ninja. The stone ninja was skilled, and the mysteries of his weapon allowed him to hold all six off for now, but it would not last. I must finish you, Tonetero.
Tonetero's wall of thorns advanced again, a solid block that would impale Neji somewhere, anywhere.
Neji spun backwards, lifting himself into the air, moving faster than Tonetero could react, falling into the midst of the thorns. "Kaiten!" His spin came down, and thorns blasted apart wide into the air.
Then something unanticipated happened.
From below the barracks edge a dark blue figure leapt into the air, shuriken flashing from her hands, with wires behind them. They buried themselves in the rooftop, and then the hands guiding them pulled taught, and made a single seal. "Now Neji!"
Tonetero lurched backward, held fast in the grasp of Shiren's charged wires.
Neji did not question, did not react, though his heart slammed and his mind clouded. "Now you die, monster!" Neji's hands flashed through the seals as fast as he could bring their forms to mind. The same sequence Xi had called forth the day before, and Tonetero saw what was coming.
His hands rose to his face, and Neji exhaled. "Dragon's Breath no Jutsu!"
It was not lightning that Neji called, but fire.
The blast of red and orange flame lit the night clearly, and Tonetero looked upon that blast and struggled to move, but Shiren's wires held fast, and no thorn, though it struck them, could slice apart those charged wires.
"I am not so easily destroyed." Tonetero's body spat thorns, and they moved before his body in a spinning, double layered screen. The thorns slid behind each other to avoid being burned to nothing, and though blasts of scorching heat penetrated, enough to singe a living man to death with the burns, the dead man's body would clearly not be destroyed. Tonetero laughed within the inferno of dragon's breath.
You monster! Neji thought, but he had not lost his focus, and so, still with the dragon's wrath in him, he saw the play of thorns move slow, and aided by the Byakugan he saw the chakra of dragon's breath advance. It is not a solid wave, but streams of energy. Neji saw, and recognized the meaning. I have you monster!
From his mouth Neji channeled the streams of chakra, seeing the pattern of Tonetero's motion, and predicting it. Suddenly the thorns that blocked dragon's breath encountered nothing but light, and the true power of this most lethal of moves penetrated to Tonetero.
The grass ninja's gasps turned to screams. He howled once, and then his thorns fell to the ground before him, and his body ignited. Then, in a flash of orange and red, Tonetero was gone.
Everything stopped.
For long seconds all heads turned to where Tonetero had stood, looking for signs of dust collecting, but there was nothing but smoke, and scorched thorns.
The grass ninja looked at each other, and at their foes, and vanished into the night.
Neji's eyes went from the place Tonetero had occupied, to the woman standing in front of him. Shiren was muddy, battered, covered in scratches, and wearing little more than remnants of her clothes, but he thought he the most beautiful sight in the world at that moment.
They said nothing, but Neji took two steps forward, and then realized that his anger was gone. The world seemed to slam to a stop, and all the strength left his limbs, so that it was Shiren that caught him.
Standing against her, Neji wrapped his arms around Shiren's warm form, and they lowered each other to the rooftop.
Shiren put her arms around Neji as well, holding him against her. "Thank you for coming to save me, Neji." She said the words softly, and whispered his name into his ear.
"Shiren." Neji replied. "Thank you for coming to save me." He placed his hand in her long dark hair, unbound now, and rested his head against hers. "Shiren, I-"Neji began.
"Quiet." Shiren whispered. "I know Neji, me too." She smiled at him, and that much at least was untouched by her captivity. "So don't spoil this moment." So they stayed on the rooftop, and they sat like that for some time.
Dar, standing below, looked around, assessing things. He noted quickly that the fires were not lit. Considering that strange Dar looked out along the remnants of the wall. There he caught a glimpse of a slim figure looking out over the destruction.
Dar raised his sword to his eyes, and gazed through the weapon, and he recognized the figure of a female ninja, wearing gnarled branches on her back. Aburanki Kei.
Kei, staring out at the two ninja in their embrace, wondered what it all meant. I have paid back my debt, and seen Tonetero destroyed, but twelve of my countrymen lie dead, and this place is destroyed. Did I do the right thing?
Looking down Kei's vision chanced upon Dar. That ninja, who is he. She took a closer look. That is the stone ninja who came and told me Tonetero was dead after the exam! He is no medical ninja, who is he? Kei did not know.
Dar, seeing Kei looking at him, and recognizing this young ninja as the source of Shiren's timely appearance, raised his crystal sword in a salute.
Surprised, Kei returned the gesture with a kunai, and then leapt off the palisade and ran off into the darkness of the night.
Author's Notes: I'm keeping the pace, so here's the new chapter, and finally the resolution to the current problem, and enough violence that I've finally caved and upgraded the rating to R, something I dislike doing, but I suppose it is necessary for this and some of what is to come, considering the apparent sensitivity of FF.net.
As a side note, I finally managed to see the Jump Festa 2004, and it appears that this story conflicts with the Naruto course not in the main plotline, but in my creation of Hidden Waterfall. Frankly, I think my Mizuho wielding borderline psychos who had the guts to take Xi on are a lot better than those portrayed in the OVA, I mean, could they have created a village that was more pathetic? Naruto and Sasuke could have conquered the whole place.
Whatever, enjoy and please review!
The Dragon's Wrath
In the depths of night, with the crescent moon high in a sky filled with scattered clouds Neji decides it is time. I am going to get Shiren back now. He thought as he stood up slowly. As he moved slowly, behind the shelter of the small tree, working out the tensions in his muscles that had built up from lying on the ground for hours. Neji's mind crystallized around the plan he had formed. It was very simple, as he had told Dar before, and yet it would require the full use of his powers. I will need speed to match anything I have ever seen for this to work. Neji knew. Yet, there is a way. All it took was the memory of Shiren's face to remove any doubts from Neji's mind about what he must do.
The only jutsu that can destroy Tonetero is dragon breath. Neji had realized that since even before the flight from that battle had finished. At first it had made him hopeless, since he had never completed the move, but now it was comforting. Though Neji had no idea how he would approach fighting Tonetero when he reached him, he knew what the final move must be, the only move that would matter.
Dar stood up beside him, likewise stretching his muscles for readiness, and repositioning his sword on his belt, able to draw that crystalline weapon whenever he needed.
A quick glance at the stone ninja recalled the assumptions Neji had made about him. It was strange, but he found he trusted Dar, even though he had met the ninja really only a day before. He is like Gosain, Neji decided, recognizing that he had already begun to think of the two ninja in the same way. They are similar, but there are differences, and Dar is a dragon ninja, or will be. He is reliable for this. There was only one fear Neji had about Dar now. He is quick, but I wonder if he can keep up.
"Dar, it's time." Neji told him.
Dar shrugged, staying silent.
Neji looked away from the stone ninja, and down toward the distant fort. Four kilometers, that is the distance. They will certainly detect us when we get within three, if not before. They must not have any time to react. Neji placed his hands together, forming a single seal, one known to every ninja, Ryu, the dragon. He held the seal for a long time, focusing his mind, but doing nothing with chakra, instead he pushed all thought of that power away, for this technique was nothing of chakra. Instead he called two images into his mind. The first was of Shiren, missing, captive, taken from him. Neji had never been able to do this technique before, and he knew that there were two reasons. One was his failure to be a dragon ninja, a failure to recognize the killing spirit in him, and the second was the lack of a sufficient focus. Tonetero has given me one, and it will be his death. Neji felt his anger and hatred boil up, and he gathered it to him, pushing it slowly out of his mind, focusing it into all parts of him, dispersing that anger under the cold killing vision of a dragon ninja, letting it soak into every bit of him, so that it was fully part of him. Then Neji called up the second image, the image of Wusashu that he had long tried to forget, of the dragon's absolute rage when he obliterated Mizain Seve, the destructive fury of those alien eyes, completely without mercy and drawing upon a reserve of power that it seemed no body could contain.
Neji's hands moved, the seal folding in and slamming his knuckles together with a crack. "Dragon's Wrath." He whispered in a voice that was not his own, but seemed to come from some other place, well beyond him.
Dar, watching the motion, could not see the hands move, and he wondered what happened.
For Neji the world seemed to shift into slow motion around him, and everything went absolutely crystal clear. He could feel and detect precisely how much strength and energy he had, and he could feel it begging for release, his body burned with the energy it had unleashed within itself.
"Dar, run as fast as you can." Neji told him.
"What?" Dar asked, confusion in his voice.
Neji's hand whipped down, grabbing the nekode from his legs and lifting them back up.
Dar blinked, and then again. The nekode had just materialized on Neji's hands. Dar recognized that he must have reached down and grabbed them, but that wasn't possible. No human can move that fast, even with chakra, the nerves can't move that fast, they can't!
Neji took a step forward, and then he ran.
To Dar it appeared as a white and tan blur advancing in the darkness, as he desperately started to run to catch up. The Stone ninja had never seen anything like that, except the movements of the dragon, Sirachi, the day before.
Dragon's Wrath, Neji recalled Xi's explanation silently as he dashed forward, pushing his newfound speed to the utmost. The move was like Lotus in many ways, and yet it was different. Lotus increased the power and demand placed on the muscles, overriding the brain's restrictions. Dragon's Wrath went beyond that. It did not affect the muscles, but the nerves. There is a limit to the speed of human nerves, one not even chakra can overcome, an absolute upper maximum that certain ninja, such as Uchiha Itachi, might reach during their lifetimes. There is no earthly way past that limit, Xi had told Neji, but the anger of a dragon is not a thing of this world, and neither is the essence of a human who can break through all barriers. If you summon the Dragon's Wrath the only limit to the speed and power of your reactions if your own will, the very speed of your thoughts.
Like Lotus, this incredibly powerful technique had a price, this exertion of anger made one with the power to strike. Once exhausted the user could do nothing, not even move, until rested, and even then it would take some time for the body to recover, but that was not the greatest danger. The greatest danger was to lose control during wrath, for without the limitations of the nerves, a ninja could easily move so fast and strong as to rip their own body apart. "Therefore, you must use this only when absolutely necessary." Xi had told Neji.
Now is such a time. I will get Shiren back from you Tonetero, or I will die in the attempt! Neji swore.
The land flew by in Neji's sight, the Byakugan already enveloping his eyes. He saw the wall, his objective, and how far he had to travel to reach it. He slashed over the ground then, terrifyingly quick, blasting past the maximum speed of a human, to reach the speed of a running cat across the plains, a creature of the air and the earth.
The grass ninja saw this streak, and heard the screaming sound Neji's advance made across the scrubland. Grass ninja ran to the wall, grabbing for their weapons and reaching the position, considering what they could do.
It was too late. "Too slow!" Neji thundered, leaping into the air to cover the last segment like a launched missile. He saw the grass ninja raise weapons or form seals in the beginnings of a counterattack, but it was all too late. Nekode outreached, and Neji reached the wall.
"Rend!" It was like the impact of some hellish weapon from a world not yet made, as if a great bird had slammed down from the heavens to hit the wooden wall.
The wall burst apart, flinging ninja and fragments of wood everywhere, mingling both together, so that ninja screamed and died as great shards of wood slashed through their bodies. Ten ninja removed from the opposition before they had time to even strike.
Yet Neji was not done. Even as Tonetero's head turned and he saw exactly what had happened, shock breaking out over his face, Neji was already moving.
Two grass ninja stood between him and the building Tonetero stood upon.
Neji slashed through them, moving his arms around their weapons, will and chakra guiding his movements, under and over swords, to bring nekode through the vulnerable points, leaving them behind before they even had time to realize they were dead.
As Neji landed in front of him, Tonetero turned fully to face the dragon ninja. "You!" He hissed. "You dare!" Thorns whirled around him like a great swarm of brown knives. "Kill him you fools!"
The seven grass ninja who yet stood in the compound hesitated for a moment. Their faces were torn, did they attack this ninja who had just slain half of them, this specter who moved like a monster and not a man, or did they disobey the true monster, the one who could not die. Though they hesitated, they were about the first took a step toward Neji, the madness in Tonetero's eyes having decided them.
"You have other concerns!" That came from the voice of Kataishi Dar, whose crystalline blade shattered the katana one of the men held and then slashed a horrid gash into his side. The remaining grass ninja, seeing this enemy, a dangerous man to be sure, but one they could fight, turned to face him.
"You traitors!" Tonetero howled, then his head jerked around in fear.
"Clawing Whirlwind!" Neji's lethal spin impacted upon that screen of thorns, slashing and clawing, slicing the wooden spikes into diced pieces. When the move completed the screen of thorns lay broken upon the rooftop. "You should be concerned for yourself." Neji said through eyes empty of any feeling. This was not even killing, it was the destruction of a thing that should already have been dead, one that had dared to attack him and imprison Shiren.
Tonetero slid back swiftly, bringing his hands together. "We build things from wood here!" He shouted back. The roof cracked under his feet, and a new storm of thorns, including many pieces of the old rose up around him.
Damn! Neji thought. There must be a way to penetrate that wall of thorns. As long as it is up he will dodge away from dragon breath as he did with Xi.
"It is useless." Tonetero laughed, and a stream of wooden missiles launched themselves at Neji.
They would have seemed fast as arrows from a bow had a normal person been watching, and they came in from all sides.
Neji simply raised his hands, and his motion blurred, in a moment all the thorns crashed to the ground, crushed.
Tonetero's eyes went wide, and the shock in him was clear. Yet the dead man was beyond fear, fully in the throes of the madness of Edo Tensei, the instability that encompassed a psyche allowed free reign after returning from death. He readied to attack again.
There must be a way! Neji thought, even as he saw Dar spin and fall back from the assault of grass ninja. The stone ninja was skilled, and the mysteries of his weapon allowed him to hold all six off for now, but it would not last. I must finish you, Tonetero.
Tonetero's wall of thorns advanced again, a solid block that would impale Neji somewhere, anywhere.
Neji spun backwards, lifting himself into the air, moving faster than Tonetero could react, falling into the midst of the thorns. "Kaiten!" His spin came down, and thorns blasted apart wide into the air.
Then something unanticipated happened.
From below the barracks edge a dark blue figure leapt into the air, shuriken flashing from her hands, with wires behind them. They buried themselves in the rooftop, and then the hands guiding them pulled taught, and made a single seal. "Now Neji!"
Tonetero lurched backward, held fast in the grasp of Shiren's charged wires.
Neji did not question, did not react, though his heart slammed and his mind clouded. "Now you die, monster!" Neji's hands flashed through the seals as fast as he could bring their forms to mind. The same sequence Xi had called forth the day before, and Tonetero saw what was coming.
His hands rose to his face, and Neji exhaled. "Dragon's Breath no Jutsu!"
It was not lightning that Neji called, but fire.
The blast of red and orange flame lit the night clearly, and Tonetero looked upon that blast and struggled to move, but Shiren's wires held fast, and no thorn, though it struck them, could slice apart those charged wires.
"I am not so easily destroyed." Tonetero's body spat thorns, and they moved before his body in a spinning, double layered screen. The thorns slid behind each other to avoid being burned to nothing, and though blasts of scorching heat penetrated, enough to singe a living man to death with the burns, the dead man's body would clearly not be destroyed. Tonetero laughed within the inferno of dragon's breath.
You monster! Neji thought, but he had not lost his focus, and so, still with the dragon's wrath in him, he saw the play of thorns move slow, and aided by the Byakugan he saw the chakra of dragon's breath advance. It is not a solid wave, but streams of energy. Neji saw, and recognized the meaning. I have you monster!
From his mouth Neji channeled the streams of chakra, seeing the pattern of Tonetero's motion, and predicting it. Suddenly the thorns that blocked dragon's breath encountered nothing but light, and the true power of this most lethal of moves penetrated to Tonetero.
The grass ninja's gasps turned to screams. He howled once, and then his thorns fell to the ground before him, and his body ignited. Then, in a flash of orange and red, Tonetero was gone.
Everything stopped.
For long seconds all heads turned to where Tonetero had stood, looking for signs of dust collecting, but there was nothing but smoke, and scorched thorns.
The grass ninja looked at each other, and at their foes, and vanished into the night.
Neji's eyes went from the place Tonetero had occupied, to the woman standing in front of him. Shiren was muddy, battered, covered in scratches, and wearing little more than remnants of her clothes, but he thought he the most beautiful sight in the world at that moment.
They said nothing, but Neji took two steps forward, and then realized that his anger was gone. The world seemed to slam to a stop, and all the strength left his limbs, so that it was Shiren that caught him.
Standing against her, Neji wrapped his arms around Shiren's warm form, and they lowered each other to the rooftop.
Shiren put her arms around Neji as well, holding him against her. "Thank you for coming to save me, Neji." She said the words softly, and whispered his name into his ear.
"Shiren." Neji replied. "Thank you for coming to save me." He placed his hand in her long dark hair, unbound now, and rested his head against hers. "Shiren, I-"Neji began.
"Quiet." Shiren whispered. "I know Neji, me too." She smiled at him, and that much at least was untouched by her captivity. "So don't spoil this moment." So they stayed on the rooftop, and they sat like that for some time.
Dar, standing below, looked around, assessing things. He noted quickly that the fires were not lit. Considering that strange Dar looked out along the remnants of the wall. There he caught a glimpse of a slim figure looking out over the destruction.
Dar raised his sword to his eyes, and gazed through the weapon, and he recognized the figure of a female ninja, wearing gnarled branches on her back. Aburanki Kei.
Kei, staring out at the two ninja in their embrace, wondered what it all meant. I have paid back my debt, and seen Tonetero destroyed, but twelve of my countrymen lie dead, and this place is destroyed. Did I do the right thing?
Looking down Kei's vision chanced upon Dar. That ninja, who is he. She took a closer look. That is the stone ninja who came and told me Tonetero was dead after the exam! He is no medical ninja, who is he? Kei did not know.
Dar, seeing Kei looking at him, and recognizing this young ninja as the source of Shiren's timely appearance, raised his crystal sword in a salute.
Surprised, Kei returned the gesture with a kunai, and then leapt off the palisade and ran off into the darkness of the night.