Notice: I do not Naruto and make no claims on the copyright to its world or
characters. However, this story features numerous original characters who
belong to me, the most relevant being: Draci Xi, Kabure Gosain, Senirai
Shiren, Kataishi Dar, Aburanki Kei, Mehize Kizen, The Raikage, Tonetero,
The Dark Storm, and the various dragons, Sirachi, Wusashu, and others.
Various ideas presented within this story, such as the Dragon Ninja, the
Mizuho Bloodline, and so on, are also my personal creations.
Author's Notes: So, the end has come, the final battle and the resolution of this whole story. Well, here it is, I won't say anything more. Please take the time to read the short epilogue and postscript to follow, and post a review if you can, I'd like to know just who made it to the end.
Dragon Ninja
Morning did not come the next day. The skies were covered by a black storm that pelted rain and crackled with thunder all night and day. It was dark as twilight from the moment Xi awoke all through the long walk they made.
The four dragon ninja walked slowly through the ground of lightning. There was no hurry, Xi knew exactly where they were going, and the place the Dark Storm would meet her hunters.
She is not without a sense of irony, so it will be in the same place as before, that place we fought eight years ago, the last time she faced four hunters. Xi could recall it perfectly, and so he made for that wooded clearing, a slow walk, taking the time to fully heal any damage. When the time came they would all be at full strength.
Yet, what good does it do? Xi thought, looking at the three other dragon ninja who walked with him. Their minds and hearts are clean, they go forward to battle with no regrets, and expect, as most do, that they will be victorious. It will not be enough. Xi had felt the full power of the Dark Storm, had seen her shake off the attack Neji had wielded against her, a power he could not have hoped to match, a technique that could slay anyone, but was useless against this being they went to oppose. Only a single killing blow will work, but who could find that? She is all but invincible.
A dark voice inside Xi offered a way, and as he walked he fingered something hidden beneath his flak jacket, carried always on his chest, below the statuette that was the Heart of the Dragon. A single scroll, small and black, crumpled with age, but bound tight and sealed. Four dragon artifacts, the scroll of summoning, the Heart of the Dragon, the Dragon's Claws, and this. Xi knew what the scroll was, Naravki had told him long ago. He knew what it contained within, a thing of darkness and evil beyond reckoning, a thing that had been bound there for hundreds of years, a demon without a name, called only The Corrupt. Naravki had said it was a thing of ultimate shame to the dragons, and ultimate destruction, but he knew nothing more. Yet, the sealing method was known. If unsealed, it would be bound to fulfill a request of the one who unsealed it. Naravki had not known, but he had believed all his life that the scroll had been sealed by the very first to become a dragon ninja.
Xi fingered the scroll, recalling all the promises he had made, as he walked closer to the meeting with the Dark Storm. We cannot win, she is beyond any ninja, but I must fulfill that which I swore to do. I cannot fail my final mission.
Eventually Xi took his hand from the thing, and considered it as he walked, but though he searched his soul, he came to no decision.
At a time that might be said to be mid-afternoon had black clouds not covered the sky and blotted out the sun to create perpetual twilight they reached their destination.
From the trees the four ninja descended on the clearing, looking for their enemy, only to find she was not there.
Then the trees before them were slammed to the ground with terrible violence, as a massive creature descended from above, and in its hand stood the Dark Storm.
It was gigantic, two hundred feet tall at least, and shaped vaguely like a man, but made of cloud, lightning, and thunder. It was black as night, and yet held a smoky energy and bold malevolence. Its eyes were red slashes of burning fire, and it had a great vortex of clouds for a mouth. The dragon ninja looked up at it in awe and dread.
"Do you like my summons?" The Dark Storm laughed as she descended to stand before them. "You see, now I am prepared, I have called the very blackness of the storm to my side. Even if you manage to threaten me, you cannot fight."
Xi reached under his flak jacket and pulled out the black scroll. His hand grasped the seal. There is no other way. He decided. I swore that I would kill her, no matter the cost.
"Well." The Dark Storm looked at Xi with no small amusement. "You intend to use that against me?" She grimaced. "Do you dare, Draci Xi? Will you unleash the contents of that scroll upon the world just to kill me? You will unleash a demon of the ancient times to strike me down. FOOL!" She shouted with the crackle of thunder. "It will recognize me as its brother, this thing you call, and I shall cow it and we will ravage the world together. I will feed it your companions and your soul! Unleash this thing and doom not only yourself, but them as well, and all lightning and that which follows. Come Xi!" She cackled with mad glee. "Unseal the scroll and complete my purpose for me even as I am struck down."
Xi held his thumb at the lip of that black scroll. She must be destroyed; there is no other way to do it.
Neji, Shiren and Dar looked at Xi in confusion, and the shock was in their eyes, wondering what was happening, what the thing Xi held was.
Xi could not see them, he stood before them, but he could feel their eyes on him. I am the hunter, it does not matter. The mission is the only concern. Xi resolved himself behind his white mask, but still those eyes looked at him, and Xi saw Neji's eyes stare at him, those inhuman white eyes, and in his mind they stretched to become the white and red lenses that saw through everything, the eyes of the heavens. Xi felt those eyes judging him, and he all but despaired. Why? He demanded of himself. I owe them nothing!
"Because we are dragon ninja, and so are you." Shiren's words echoed in Xi in that moment, and he realized why they had come with him, these three children, his students. We are the dragon ninja; he remembered what he had learned long ago. Our path is the hardest of all, for we undertake to damn ourselves as killers. Why do we do this? Xi remembered, and he remembered the tears that had clouded his eyes when he had almost killed Neji, and why he had done that. He remembered and his hunter's resolution unraveled, only to be replaced by something else. We kill others to protect others. Sometimes the cruelest choice is necessary for the greatest good. That is the saying that had birthed the dragon ninja. That was the nature of their strength, the cold willingness to make that choice, to take that responsibility on themselves, and to wield the power that came from it.
Promises of vengeance to the dead mean nothing. Xi saw as he looked at the Dark Storm. Such things created this creature before me, who sacrificed herself to destroy the Uchiha, and created the greatest evil Lightning has ever known, and to destroy her I was prepared to unleash an even greater one. I cannot do that, it is not the way. I will kill you for the sake of the living, Dark Storm.
Xi reached up his right hand, as the Dark Storm looked on, and he grasped his mask with it, and took it from his face, flinging it to the ground.
The four watchers gasped.
Xi slammed his foot down upon the mask, breaking it apart. "I don't need that anymore!" He shouted. "Nor do I need this!" Xi threw the black scroll over his shoulder, to land in Neji's hands. Three more things followed it. "Neji, I give the heritage of the dragon ninja to you, the scroll of summons, the Heart of the Dragon, the Dragon's Claws, and the black scroll. Keep them well, and never allow that scroll to open, keep that evil from the world." Thus, Xi did as had been done in this same clearing eight years ago.
"Xi!" The three dragon ninja behind him gasped as one.
"Stop!" Xi ordered. His eyes focused on the Dark Storm. He put out his right arm, parallel to the ground, baring passage. "Only one can face her, and this fight is mine."
"You are a fool Draci Xi!" The Dark Storm laughed. "How will you fight me without those powers? You are nothing more than a paltry fool who knows several tricks, you cannot stand against the Blackness of the Storm, nor can you fight me! I will make you watch while your companions feed my powers for your presumption!"
"You will die!" Xi retorted. "So that all may live!" His eyes suddenly shifted, becoming the red on red of the dragon's eyes, and Xi felt a surge of power within him, and something else, a sense of unlocking, and without a single pause, the Dragon's Wrath was there, its power awakened instantly.
Xi's hand blurred, and his feet thrummed with power.
"Even that means nothing here!" The Dark Storm laughed, leaping into the hands of her waiting monster.
Xi looked at the creature, and made a decision. My fight is with the Dark Storm, but I will not spare you either, monster. His hands moved, faster than the eye could follow, forming the perfect seals, calling on the chakra. "For eight years I have prepared for this Dark Storm! Learn the meaning of those years!" Claw, Fang, Gaze, Breath, Spirit, Dragon, and Circle. Xi's left hand came to his mouth, and blood flashed from it. His hands slammed to the ground with enough force to drive the soil inches downward. "I call all debts owed to me!" Xi demanded. "Dragon summoning no jutsu!"
The black storm that hung in the air above was pierced by a brilliant shaft of light that blinded the eyes of all, and blasted apart the storm to bring crystal clear skies, the ground shook and split beneath Xi's hands, and the Black storm demon howled in anger.
The sky was filled with a massive presence, a shining creature of gold, titanic and majestic, a T'ien Lung. He was three hundred feet long at least, with claws to slice great trees apart, and a maw to swallow a giant. His brilliant mane stretched back from his head a great distance, and his eyes proclaimed tremendous power and age.
This was Izanagami, child of gods, eldest of dragons, and Lord of the Skies.
"Demon corrupter!" The dragon roared. "Come forth and be cleansed from the world!" When the dragon spoke the trees bent and cracked, and the demon that carried the Dark Storm rose into the sky to face his eternal foe, dropping the ninja he carried to the ground.
The Dark Storm stood in front of Draci Xi.
"This is the end." Xi proclaimed, and he took his own simple nekode from his hips, and placed them on his hands.
"I shall not allow this." The Dark Storm replied, and swords of black lightning emerged from her hands.
The twin battles began.
To the three who watched, the battles were almost impossible to follow. Above them the skies shook and powers mighty and ancient, two visions of the power of the sky, clashed and ravaged. For miles they could be seen, the war of powers like unto gods above. The claws and teeth of the dragon against the demon's fists of lightning, the fiery breath versus the stifling cloud. It was awesome and imperious, and the eyes of every ninja across the nation turned and saw in awe, seeing the fate of their Country of Lightning on display in the sky.
Yet it was the smaller battle that mattered to the three dragon ninja who stood before that clearing.
It was difficult to observe, the speed of Xi and the Dark Storm surpassed even Neji's eyes, and only moments of motion and blurs of energy could be seen to crackle about the clearing, while the calls of moves and the torment of pain carried clear to the ears of those who watched.
"Rend!" Xi's nekode slashed through the lightning blades of the Dark Storm, to score a gash across her torso, but her energy burned him in return, and he took a slash along the face, burning and scoring, in payment.
It continued, with dragon jutsus and black lightning illuminating the sky in power and chakra. Every movement by Xi was perfection itself, the flawless performance of a ninja at the absolute height of achievement. Watching him Neji saw the dragon in his movements, and Xi surpassed the grace of the heavenly lord above as he strove against his foe.
Dark powers governed the Dark Storm, and she responded from every angle, a raging torrent of lightning and obliteration, countering every strike with pain and furry, animalistic darkness from before humanity knew shelter from the storm.
A flash of the fight, Xi came in from below, out positioning the Dark Storm on the right side. "Back Rake!" His left foot cut across her body, punching holes in her arm, causing it to go limp.
Another flash, whips of lightning reached out and bent Xi's left ankle past the point of breaking, but he did not slow.
Again and again they saw, dragon jutsus flared, and lightning countered, black and consuming. Wounds multiplied, slashes and cuts, stabs and piercings, Xi bit into the Dark Storm's face, ripping free a chunk of her cheek, and she slashed long nails along his neck, burying them in his flesh.
It went on and on, and Neji could see no end, the power of the fighters seemed not at all diminished. It could go on forever, like the eternal clash of feuding gods, locked in combat to the end of time, unable to reach a decision, but refusing to back down.
But these warriors were all too human, though one be one with the dragon inside humans, and the other with the demonic darkness that waits there. The end would come.
The battle above was suddenly decided, beyond anyone's expectation.
Izanagami's jaws sank into the demon's neck and clamped down, refusing to let go even as lightning ravaged his body from the creature's hands. "Come," The dragon sounded in a voice that carried far across the miles. "I leave the world to my children, let us go to the next realm together monster!"
There was a growl of demonic agony, and a dragon's roar of triumph, and then both were gone, in a flash that rained down rainbow motes of light across the lightning country.
"Dragon's Breath no Jutsu!" Xi screamed, and a tremendous blast of lightning shot from his mouth, to strike not the Dark Storm, but a rock beneath her. Stone exploded, and a blast of sizzling shards ripped her skin and shredded it.
A moment of advantage! Neji saw it.
Xi attacked, his right hand's nekode had long since been broken, but two bloody fingers led the attack, power crackling about them as they aimed for the Dark Storm's forehead. "Dragon Fang!"
A bolt of black lightning struck the Dark Storm from above, setting her ablaze, her long midnight hair instantly burned to cinders, but the force blasted Xi backwards to lie on the ground, forced to his knees.
Standing there, fire blazing in her clothes, blood leaking from a dozen wounds, her right arm useless, the Dark Storm summoned a ball of lightning to her fingertips in her left hand. "I win." She wheezed. "I will take the life of one of you and from your power I will be restored. Then nothing will be able to stop me."
Neji moved to act, but Xi stood in front of him, his own wounds terrible, his body wracked and savaged, but he held up his right arm, baring the way. "Only one can face her Neji, don't interfere."
"You have failed Xi, all your dragon jutsus and your four lightning jutsus, all your tricks and techniques and all your power, and you have not killed me." The Dark Storm smiled her hellish grin beneath the blood that leaked down her face. "I told you no ninja could kill me."
Xi looked at the Dark Storm, and he could find no force to move, his energy was spent, his powers were all but gone, but he was not defeated. He turned his head and smiled at Neji. "My thanks." He whispered, and then turned back to the Dark Storm. Xi's eyes closed softly and he spoke. "You are a fool, have you forgotten? I know FIVE Lightning jutsus!"
Her face bloody and torn, cast into a demonic form, there was still enough humanity left for a look of absolute terror to break out on her face. "That is impossible!" She screamed.
Xi struck his left hand straight forward, parallel to the bloody ground beneath him, his fingers completely extended. He reached out with his right hand and grasped the arm at the elbow. "Stroke of Lightning no Jutsu!" He said slowly and carefully, but with all his will.
A bolt of lightning, pure white and blinding as the sun, came down from the clear sky to strike Draci Xi, and Neji, standing behind him, felt nothing, as all its power flowed into Xi's body, every last ounce of that energy, the power of the sky unleashed, it suddenly became Xi's.
Xi moved, and he was behind the Dark Storm, who tried to dodge, but she moved at a speed that was limited, and Xi moved as the lightning, without gap in time, he stepped and was there, no reaction could function to stop him. His hands came in behind the Dark Storm's neck, and there were suddenly kunai there.
The blades slashed in and met flesh, and cut deep, slashing arteries and veins, cutting down to bone, and leaving the Dark Storm's dead body to fall forward into the bloody earth.
"Xi!" The three dragon ninja called as one, as Xi fell behind her, the surface of his body burned away utterly, leaving the blackened remains of a man still burning away to nothing.
Neji, Shiren, and Dar were around Xi in an instant, searching for something they could do, anything, but it was obvious that there was nothing.
Xi's body was burning from the inside out from the force he had absorbed. Soon he would be gone.
Turning his head Xi looked up through burned away eyes at his students, for though the organs were gone with the power of lightning in him he could still see. "Draci Neji, Draci Shiren, Draci Dar." He said the words slowly. "I have completed my mission." Draci Xi spoke his last words.
Tears in his eyes Neji took his hands away from the crumbling body, and stood, Shiren and Dar followed the motion.
Neji placed his right hand over his chest, forming a fist, and tears flowed down his cheeks as the three dragon ninja watched their teacher crumble to dust before them, his own pyre set and completed, leaving nothing behind.
As they watched the dusty flakes were caught by the wind and rose high into the sky to join with the rainbow motes of dragon light and ascend to the heavens above.
Elsewhere the body of the Dark Storm rotted away to nothing in moments, leaving no legacy at all.
Neji sank to the ground, drained completely, his thoughts empty. Then something caught his eye, a white flash in this brown and bloody mess. His head turned, and he saw the pieces of Xi's mask.
Slowly Neji stood and walked over to it, the half mask had been stomped upon by Xi, breaking the porcelain into pieces. There were four.
Picking up the pieces Neji felt them in his hands, still sharp, and he felt a power in them, and a memory. Xi would not want us to lie here uselessly. Neji knew immediately. We are the dragon ninja; we must carry on the work he began.
"Shiren, Dar." Neji motioned them over, the other two dragon ninja slowly detached from the ground and walked over to meet Neji's tired form. Neji put out his hand, and there he held the four pieces of Xi's mask. "Each of us should carry one, to remember and guide us."
Dar reached out and took the piece the represented the base of the mask, Shiren the top center, and Neji took the top in his right hand.
"There are four pieces." Dar remarked. "We are only three."
"Likewise there are four dragon artifacts." Neji said slowly, holding up the four things Xi had thrown to him before. "I believe Xi meant for there to be four of us in time, a platoon of Dragon Ninja, just as we were when he was with us." Neji looked at his comrades. "No one ninja should hold all of these. I will keep the summoning scroll." Neji said, and placed in under his shirt. "Xi said it would pass to me when he was gone." Neji recalled with tears in his eyes. He turned to Shiren. "Shiren, I give you the heart of the dragon." He held out the sinuous red statuette. "Because you are the heart behind us, and have never once lost hope and energy." He turned to Dar. "I will give you the black scroll, since you have already mastered one hidden evil, and have the strength to hold another." Shiren and Dar took the artifacts, and placed them within their own ninja garb, carefully tucked away. "I will hold the Dragon's Claws for now, but they belong to another, whomever is to be the fourth in our fellowship."
"What do we do now?" Dar asked after a moment's pause. "Draci Xi held us together, but we are from different villages, can we remain as a group?"
Neji looked at the piece of Xi's mask. "We shall stay together." He answered. "I am not leaving Shiren's side." Shiren nodded her support, and her eyes carried far more. "And I want you to continue with us Dar, if you would."
"I would, but what if I am commanded elsewhere?" The stone ninja requested.
"We will be bound to no village." Shiren told him. "And to them all. She held up the piece of Xi's mask. "Missing-nins are criminals before all, we will hunt them. It is the task of the dragon ninja, the work Xi began, and left to us to finish."
Neji and Dar slowly nodded. "So it will be." Neji replied. "For now though, we must wait here a while."
The remainder of the afternoon passed in slow silence, and the three dragon ninja gradually looked at their grief and remembered, slowly working past it, strengthening their bonds to each other, and honoring the memory of the ninja who had been their leader, and the truest representative of their way.
In the morning Kabure Gosain found them.
The chuunin led a large group of lightning ninja, armed for war. They were forty at least, though Neji did not bother to count. They swept cautiously onto the battlefield, and then stopped in awe at what they saw.
Gosain approached the three dragon ninja, who stood to meet him.
"What happened?" Gosain asked, suspicion and sadness in his eyes.
"It ended." Neji answered him. "Draci Xi slew the Dark Storm at the cost of his own life."
"I see." Gosain replied, and held back his emotions. "Then the war is over!" He called to his companions. "We are finally free of that demon!"
The lightning ninja broke out into cheers, but Gosain remained grim.
"What will you do Gosain?" Neji asked him over the joyous shouts and acclamations.
"I will take them back to Cloud." He answered. "We will have to find a new Raikage, if there is anyone able to assume the position, perhaps the head of Clan Heposiri, who was not in the village when the Dark Storm struck. I will go back to leading missions for genin, and we will try to rebuild our village." Gosain looked at Neji, Shiren, and Dar. "What will you do?"
"Go to Cloud with you, for now." Shiren said. "We should tell the tale of what happened here to everyone, how the Skies themselves reprimanded the Dark Storm. Then we will travel to all the countries, to hunt down the missing-nins who endanger the peace."
"I see," Gosain replied. "It will probably be welcome. Our own hunter- nins are among the dead, or so I've been told. It will be a long time before we are strong again. Perhaps it will be until a true leader rises to the rank of Raikage."
There is more strength in Lightning than you believe, Gosain. Neji thought, looking at his former teammate. He saw the looks the other ninja, many older than Gosain, gave him. You are a leader already, you will help lightning recover, it will become strong again soon enough.
That night, as they rested in the ravaged Cloud Village, Neji laid his head next to Shiren, while Dar sat by the door. "I wonder, how shall we find a fourth dragon ninja, it was Xi who found all of us?"
"There are things we share," Shiren replied. "It will be someone like that."
"Perhaps, there is someone like that already." Dar remarked. "Another who stands on the edge, and who understands the nature of our path."
The three dragon ninja shared a thought. Perhaps. The future is waiting to be made.
Author's Notes: So, the end has come, the final battle and the resolution of this whole story. Well, here it is, I won't say anything more. Please take the time to read the short epilogue and postscript to follow, and post a review if you can, I'd like to know just who made it to the end.
Dragon Ninja
Morning did not come the next day. The skies were covered by a black storm that pelted rain and crackled with thunder all night and day. It was dark as twilight from the moment Xi awoke all through the long walk they made.
The four dragon ninja walked slowly through the ground of lightning. There was no hurry, Xi knew exactly where they were going, and the place the Dark Storm would meet her hunters.
She is not without a sense of irony, so it will be in the same place as before, that place we fought eight years ago, the last time she faced four hunters. Xi could recall it perfectly, and so he made for that wooded clearing, a slow walk, taking the time to fully heal any damage. When the time came they would all be at full strength.
Yet, what good does it do? Xi thought, looking at the three other dragon ninja who walked with him. Their minds and hearts are clean, they go forward to battle with no regrets, and expect, as most do, that they will be victorious. It will not be enough. Xi had felt the full power of the Dark Storm, had seen her shake off the attack Neji had wielded against her, a power he could not have hoped to match, a technique that could slay anyone, but was useless against this being they went to oppose. Only a single killing blow will work, but who could find that? She is all but invincible.
A dark voice inside Xi offered a way, and as he walked he fingered something hidden beneath his flak jacket, carried always on his chest, below the statuette that was the Heart of the Dragon. A single scroll, small and black, crumpled with age, but bound tight and sealed. Four dragon artifacts, the scroll of summoning, the Heart of the Dragon, the Dragon's Claws, and this. Xi knew what the scroll was, Naravki had told him long ago. He knew what it contained within, a thing of darkness and evil beyond reckoning, a thing that had been bound there for hundreds of years, a demon without a name, called only The Corrupt. Naravki had said it was a thing of ultimate shame to the dragons, and ultimate destruction, but he knew nothing more. Yet, the sealing method was known. If unsealed, it would be bound to fulfill a request of the one who unsealed it. Naravki had not known, but he had believed all his life that the scroll had been sealed by the very first to become a dragon ninja.
Xi fingered the scroll, recalling all the promises he had made, as he walked closer to the meeting with the Dark Storm. We cannot win, she is beyond any ninja, but I must fulfill that which I swore to do. I cannot fail my final mission.
Eventually Xi took his hand from the thing, and considered it as he walked, but though he searched his soul, he came to no decision.
At a time that might be said to be mid-afternoon had black clouds not covered the sky and blotted out the sun to create perpetual twilight they reached their destination.
From the trees the four ninja descended on the clearing, looking for their enemy, only to find she was not there.
Then the trees before them were slammed to the ground with terrible violence, as a massive creature descended from above, and in its hand stood the Dark Storm.
It was gigantic, two hundred feet tall at least, and shaped vaguely like a man, but made of cloud, lightning, and thunder. It was black as night, and yet held a smoky energy and bold malevolence. Its eyes were red slashes of burning fire, and it had a great vortex of clouds for a mouth. The dragon ninja looked up at it in awe and dread.
"Do you like my summons?" The Dark Storm laughed as she descended to stand before them. "You see, now I am prepared, I have called the very blackness of the storm to my side. Even if you manage to threaten me, you cannot fight."
Xi reached under his flak jacket and pulled out the black scroll. His hand grasped the seal. There is no other way. He decided. I swore that I would kill her, no matter the cost.
"Well." The Dark Storm looked at Xi with no small amusement. "You intend to use that against me?" She grimaced. "Do you dare, Draci Xi? Will you unleash the contents of that scroll upon the world just to kill me? You will unleash a demon of the ancient times to strike me down. FOOL!" She shouted with the crackle of thunder. "It will recognize me as its brother, this thing you call, and I shall cow it and we will ravage the world together. I will feed it your companions and your soul! Unleash this thing and doom not only yourself, but them as well, and all lightning and that which follows. Come Xi!" She cackled with mad glee. "Unseal the scroll and complete my purpose for me even as I am struck down."
Xi held his thumb at the lip of that black scroll. She must be destroyed; there is no other way to do it.
Neji, Shiren and Dar looked at Xi in confusion, and the shock was in their eyes, wondering what was happening, what the thing Xi held was.
Xi could not see them, he stood before them, but he could feel their eyes on him. I am the hunter, it does not matter. The mission is the only concern. Xi resolved himself behind his white mask, but still those eyes looked at him, and Xi saw Neji's eyes stare at him, those inhuman white eyes, and in his mind they stretched to become the white and red lenses that saw through everything, the eyes of the heavens. Xi felt those eyes judging him, and he all but despaired. Why? He demanded of himself. I owe them nothing!
"Because we are dragon ninja, and so are you." Shiren's words echoed in Xi in that moment, and he realized why they had come with him, these three children, his students. We are the dragon ninja; he remembered what he had learned long ago. Our path is the hardest of all, for we undertake to damn ourselves as killers. Why do we do this? Xi remembered, and he remembered the tears that had clouded his eyes when he had almost killed Neji, and why he had done that. He remembered and his hunter's resolution unraveled, only to be replaced by something else. We kill others to protect others. Sometimes the cruelest choice is necessary for the greatest good. That is the saying that had birthed the dragon ninja. That was the nature of their strength, the cold willingness to make that choice, to take that responsibility on themselves, and to wield the power that came from it.
Promises of vengeance to the dead mean nothing. Xi saw as he looked at the Dark Storm. Such things created this creature before me, who sacrificed herself to destroy the Uchiha, and created the greatest evil Lightning has ever known, and to destroy her I was prepared to unleash an even greater one. I cannot do that, it is not the way. I will kill you for the sake of the living, Dark Storm.
Xi reached up his right hand, as the Dark Storm looked on, and he grasped his mask with it, and took it from his face, flinging it to the ground.
The four watchers gasped.
Xi slammed his foot down upon the mask, breaking it apart. "I don't need that anymore!" He shouted. "Nor do I need this!" Xi threw the black scroll over his shoulder, to land in Neji's hands. Three more things followed it. "Neji, I give the heritage of the dragon ninja to you, the scroll of summons, the Heart of the Dragon, the Dragon's Claws, and the black scroll. Keep them well, and never allow that scroll to open, keep that evil from the world." Thus, Xi did as had been done in this same clearing eight years ago.
"Xi!" The three dragon ninja behind him gasped as one.
"Stop!" Xi ordered. His eyes focused on the Dark Storm. He put out his right arm, parallel to the ground, baring passage. "Only one can face her, and this fight is mine."
"You are a fool Draci Xi!" The Dark Storm laughed. "How will you fight me without those powers? You are nothing more than a paltry fool who knows several tricks, you cannot stand against the Blackness of the Storm, nor can you fight me! I will make you watch while your companions feed my powers for your presumption!"
"You will die!" Xi retorted. "So that all may live!" His eyes suddenly shifted, becoming the red on red of the dragon's eyes, and Xi felt a surge of power within him, and something else, a sense of unlocking, and without a single pause, the Dragon's Wrath was there, its power awakened instantly.
Xi's hand blurred, and his feet thrummed with power.
"Even that means nothing here!" The Dark Storm laughed, leaping into the hands of her waiting monster.
Xi looked at the creature, and made a decision. My fight is with the Dark Storm, but I will not spare you either, monster. His hands moved, faster than the eye could follow, forming the perfect seals, calling on the chakra. "For eight years I have prepared for this Dark Storm! Learn the meaning of those years!" Claw, Fang, Gaze, Breath, Spirit, Dragon, and Circle. Xi's left hand came to his mouth, and blood flashed from it. His hands slammed to the ground with enough force to drive the soil inches downward. "I call all debts owed to me!" Xi demanded. "Dragon summoning no jutsu!"
The black storm that hung in the air above was pierced by a brilliant shaft of light that blinded the eyes of all, and blasted apart the storm to bring crystal clear skies, the ground shook and split beneath Xi's hands, and the Black storm demon howled in anger.
The sky was filled with a massive presence, a shining creature of gold, titanic and majestic, a T'ien Lung. He was three hundred feet long at least, with claws to slice great trees apart, and a maw to swallow a giant. His brilliant mane stretched back from his head a great distance, and his eyes proclaimed tremendous power and age.
This was Izanagami, child of gods, eldest of dragons, and Lord of the Skies.
"Demon corrupter!" The dragon roared. "Come forth and be cleansed from the world!" When the dragon spoke the trees bent and cracked, and the demon that carried the Dark Storm rose into the sky to face his eternal foe, dropping the ninja he carried to the ground.
The Dark Storm stood in front of Draci Xi.
"This is the end." Xi proclaimed, and he took his own simple nekode from his hips, and placed them on his hands.
"I shall not allow this." The Dark Storm replied, and swords of black lightning emerged from her hands.
The twin battles began.
To the three who watched, the battles were almost impossible to follow. Above them the skies shook and powers mighty and ancient, two visions of the power of the sky, clashed and ravaged. For miles they could be seen, the war of powers like unto gods above. The claws and teeth of the dragon against the demon's fists of lightning, the fiery breath versus the stifling cloud. It was awesome and imperious, and the eyes of every ninja across the nation turned and saw in awe, seeing the fate of their Country of Lightning on display in the sky.
Yet it was the smaller battle that mattered to the three dragon ninja who stood before that clearing.
It was difficult to observe, the speed of Xi and the Dark Storm surpassed even Neji's eyes, and only moments of motion and blurs of energy could be seen to crackle about the clearing, while the calls of moves and the torment of pain carried clear to the ears of those who watched.
"Rend!" Xi's nekode slashed through the lightning blades of the Dark Storm, to score a gash across her torso, but her energy burned him in return, and he took a slash along the face, burning and scoring, in payment.
It continued, with dragon jutsus and black lightning illuminating the sky in power and chakra. Every movement by Xi was perfection itself, the flawless performance of a ninja at the absolute height of achievement. Watching him Neji saw the dragon in his movements, and Xi surpassed the grace of the heavenly lord above as he strove against his foe.
Dark powers governed the Dark Storm, and she responded from every angle, a raging torrent of lightning and obliteration, countering every strike with pain and furry, animalistic darkness from before humanity knew shelter from the storm.
A flash of the fight, Xi came in from below, out positioning the Dark Storm on the right side. "Back Rake!" His left foot cut across her body, punching holes in her arm, causing it to go limp.
Another flash, whips of lightning reached out and bent Xi's left ankle past the point of breaking, but he did not slow.
Again and again they saw, dragon jutsus flared, and lightning countered, black and consuming. Wounds multiplied, slashes and cuts, stabs and piercings, Xi bit into the Dark Storm's face, ripping free a chunk of her cheek, and she slashed long nails along his neck, burying them in his flesh.
It went on and on, and Neji could see no end, the power of the fighters seemed not at all diminished. It could go on forever, like the eternal clash of feuding gods, locked in combat to the end of time, unable to reach a decision, but refusing to back down.
But these warriors were all too human, though one be one with the dragon inside humans, and the other with the demonic darkness that waits there. The end would come.
The battle above was suddenly decided, beyond anyone's expectation.
Izanagami's jaws sank into the demon's neck and clamped down, refusing to let go even as lightning ravaged his body from the creature's hands. "Come," The dragon sounded in a voice that carried far across the miles. "I leave the world to my children, let us go to the next realm together monster!"
There was a growl of demonic agony, and a dragon's roar of triumph, and then both were gone, in a flash that rained down rainbow motes of light across the lightning country.
"Dragon's Breath no Jutsu!" Xi screamed, and a tremendous blast of lightning shot from his mouth, to strike not the Dark Storm, but a rock beneath her. Stone exploded, and a blast of sizzling shards ripped her skin and shredded it.
A moment of advantage! Neji saw it.
Xi attacked, his right hand's nekode had long since been broken, but two bloody fingers led the attack, power crackling about them as they aimed for the Dark Storm's forehead. "Dragon Fang!"
A bolt of black lightning struck the Dark Storm from above, setting her ablaze, her long midnight hair instantly burned to cinders, but the force blasted Xi backwards to lie on the ground, forced to his knees.
Standing there, fire blazing in her clothes, blood leaking from a dozen wounds, her right arm useless, the Dark Storm summoned a ball of lightning to her fingertips in her left hand. "I win." She wheezed. "I will take the life of one of you and from your power I will be restored. Then nothing will be able to stop me."
Neji moved to act, but Xi stood in front of him, his own wounds terrible, his body wracked and savaged, but he held up his right arm, baring the way. "Only one can face her Neji, don't interfere."
"You have failed Xi, all your dragon jutsus and your four lightning jutsus, all your tricks and techniques and all your power, and you have not killed me." The Dark Storm smiled her hellish grin beneath the blood that leaked down her face. "I told you no ninja could kill me."
Xi looked at the Dark Storm, and he could find no force to move, his energy was spent, his powers were all but gone, but he was not defeated. He turned his head and smiled at Neji. "My thanks." He whispered, and then turned back to the Dark Storm. Xi's eyes closed softly and he spoke. "You are a fool, have you forgotten? I know FIVE Lightning jutsus!"
Her face bloody and torn, cast into a demonic form, there was still enough humanity left for a look of absolute terror to break out on her face. "That is impossible!" She screamed.
Xi struck his left hand straight forward, parallel to the bloody ground beneath him, his fingers completely extended. He reached out with his right hand and grasped the arm at the elbow. "Stroke of Lightning no Jutsu!" He said slowly and carefully, but with all his will.
A bolt of lightning, pure white and blinding as the sun, came down from the clear sky to strike Draci Xi, and Neji, standing behind him, felt nothing, as all its power flowed into Xi's body, every last ounce of that energy, the power of the sky unleashed, it suddenly became Xi's.
Xi moved, and he was behind the Dark Storm, who tried to dodge, but she moved at a speed that was limited, and Xi moved as the lightning, without gap in time, he stepped and was there, no reaction could function to stop him. His hands came in behind the Dark Storm's neck, and there were suddenly kunai there.
The blades slashed in and met flesh, and cut deep, slashing arteries and veins, cutting down to bone, and leaving the Dark Storm's dead body to fall forward into the bloody earth.
"Xi!" The three dragon ninja called as one, as Xi fell behind her, the surface of his body burned away utterly, leaving the blackened remains of a man still burning away to nothing.
Neji, Shiren, and Dar were around Xi in an instant, searching for something they could do, anything, but it was obvious that there was nothing.
Xi's body was burning from the inside out from the force he had absorbed. Soon he would be gone.
Turning his head Xi looked up through burned away eyes at his students, for though the organs were gone with the power of lightning in him he could still see. "Draci Neji, Draci Shiren, Draci Dar." He said the words slowly. "I have completed my mission." Draci Xi spoke his last words.
Tears in his eyes Neji took his hands away from the crumbling body, and stood, Shiren and Dar followed the motion.
Neji placed his right hand over his chest, forming a fist, and tears flowed down his cheeks as the three dragon ninja watched their teacher crumble to dust before them, his own pyre set and completed, leaving nothing behind.
As they watched the dusty flakes were caught by the wind and rose high into the sky to join with the rainbow motes of dragon light and ascend to the heavens above.
Elsewhere the body of the Dark Storm rotted away to nothing in moments, leaving no legacy at all.
Neji sank to the ground, drained completely, his thoughts empty. Then something caught his eye, a white flash in this brown and bloody mess. His head turned, and he saw the pieces of Xi's mask.
Slowly Neji stood and walked over to it, the half mask had been stomped upon by Xi, breaking the porcelain into pieces. There were four.
Picking up the pieces Neji felt them in his hands, still sharp, and he felt a power in them, and a memory. Xi would not want us to lie here uselessly. Neji knew immediately. We are the dragon ninja; we must carry on the work he began.
"Shiren, Dar." Neji motioned them over, the other two dragon ninja slowly detached from the ground and walked over to meet Neji's tired form. Neji put out his hand, and there he held the four pieces of Xi's mask. "Each of us should carry one, to remember and guide us."
Dar reached out and took the piece the represented the base of the mask, Shiren the top center, and Neji took the top in his right hand.
"There are four pieces." Dar remarked. "We are only three."
"Likewise there are four dragon artifacts." Neji said slowly, holding up the four things Xi had thrown to him before. "I believe Xi meant for there to be four of us in time, a platoon of Dragon Ninja, just as we were when he was with us." Neji looked at his comrades. "No one ninja should hold all of these. I will keep the summoning scroll." Neji said, and placed in under his shirt. "Xi said it would pass to me when he was gone." Neji recalled with tears in his eyes. He turned to Shiren. "Shiren, I give you the heart of the dragon." He held out the sinuous red statuette. "Because you are the heart behind us, and have never once lost hope and energy." He turned to Dar. "I will give you the black scroll, since you have already mastered one hidden evil, and have the strength to hold another." Shiren and Dar took the artifacts, and placed them within their own ninja garb, carefully tucked away. "I will hold the Dragon's Claws for now, but they belong to another, whomever is to be the fourth in our fellowship."
"What do we do now?" Dar asked after a moment's pause. "Draci Xi held us together, but we are from different villages, can we remain as a group?"
Neji looked at the piece of Xi's mask. "We shall stay together." He answered. "I am not leaving Shiren's side." Shiren nodded her support, and her eyes carried far more. "And I want you to continue with us Dar, if you would."
"I would, but what if I am commanded elsewhere?" The stone ninja requested.
"We will be bound to no village." Shiren told him. "And to them all. She held up the piece of Xi's mask. "Missing-nins are criminals before all, we will hunt them. It is the task of the dragon ninja, the work Xi began, and left to us to finish."
Neji and Dar slowly nodded. "So it will be." Neji replied. "For now though, we must wait here a while."
The remainder of the afternoon passed in slow silence, and the three dragon ninja gradually looked at their grief and remembered, slowly working past it, strengthening their bonds to each other, and honoring the memory of the ninja who had been their leader, and the truest representative of their way.
In the morning Kabure Gosain found them.
The chuunin led a large group of lightning ninja, armed for war. They were forty at least, though Neji did not bother to count. They swept cautiously onto the battlefield, and then stopped in awe at what they saw.
Gosain approached the three dragon ninja, who stood to meet him.
"What happened?" Gosain asked, suspicion and sadness in his eyes.
"It ended." Neji answered him. "Draci Xi slew the Dark Storm at the cost of his own life."
"I see." Gosain replied, and held back his emotions. "Then the war is over!" He called to his companions. "We are finally free of that demon!"
The lightning ninja broke out into cheers, but Gosain remained grim.
"What will you do Gosain?" Neji asked him over the joyous shouts and acclamations.
"I will take them back to Cloud." He answered. "We will have to find a new Raikage, if there is anyone able to assume the position, perhaps the head of Clan Heposiri, who was not in the village when the Dark Storm struck. I will go back to leading missions for genin, and we will try to rebuild our village." Gosain looked at Neji, Shiren, and Dar. "What will you do?"
"Go to Cloud with you, for now." Shiren said. "We should tell the tale of what happened here to everyone, how the Skies themselves reprimanded the Dark Storm. Then we will travel to all the countries, to hunt down the missing-nins who endanger the peace."
"I see," Gosain replied. "It will probably be welcome. Our own hunter- nins are among the dead, or so I've been told. It will be a long time before we are strong again. Perhaps it will be until a true leader rises to the rank of Raikage."
There is more strength in Lightning than you believe, Gosain. Neji thought, looking at his former teammate. He saw the looks the other ninja, many older than Gosain, gave him. You are a leader already, you will help lightning recover, it will become strong again soon enough.
That night, as they rested in the ravaged Cloud Village, Neji laid his head next to Shiren, while Dar sat by the door. "I wonder, how shall we find a fourth dragon ninja, it was Xi who found all of us?"
"There are things we share," Shiren replied. "It will be someone like that."
"Perhaps, there is someone like that already." Dar remarked. "Another who stands on the edge, and who understands the nature of our path."
The three dragon ninja shared a thought. Perhaps. The future is waiting to be made.