Chapter Twenty-Nine

With Ken's promotion secured and his teammate decided, the Uzumaki clan took greater initiative to begin integrating their two newly-discovered members into the Hidden Leaf and becoming a genuine clan within the village.

Firstly, the boys had taken the time to get the jump on revealing Naruto's unique status and duty within the village. Having not experienced the Nine-Tails Attack, the revelation didn't hit quite as hard as they had feared, which was good. It really boiled down to surprise that such a reputedly massive and powerful creature was sealed within such a small boy. "That's Uzumaki sealing for you," Ken laughed. "It's the next best thing to a miracle."

Not long after that, Ken was summoned before the Hokage to discuss the invasion of their home. Not only was it a severe invasion of the Uzumaki's privacy, but the house itself was the property of the Sarutobi clan, which made it an offense against two established shinobi clans.

"Unfortunately, whoever did this," Hiruzen said, pointedly avoiding saying the name Danzo, "was thorough enough to not leave any traces of evidence. Anything we could find is circumstantial at best and would not stand against anyone with, shall we say, substantial political standing." Again, the name Danzo was not said out loud, though they both knew whom they were really talking about.

"So he — or 'they' — get away scot-free?" Ken asked stonily.

"I did not say that," Lord Hiruzen replied, his tone one of stately patience. "If your report is anything to go by, whoever did this will have been unofficially chastised." Hiruzen grinned before resuming his neutral look. "I assure you, Ken, this is not something that is acceptable. I will have ANBU that I know and trust watching your home until repairs are made and will investigate this matter as thoroughly as possible while still remaining quiet."

Ken wanted to argue, but he knew that this was the best he could get. As generous as Hiruzen Sarutobi was, he had to deal with the politics of the village. Though officially no longer active, Danzo was an entrenched member of the shinobi corps with contacts spread throughout and likely any number of favors to call in. And with heritage strongly tied to the Leaf or not, Ken was a fresh chunin who had served in Konoha's shinobi corps for less than a year. Until Danzo made a grievous mistake, the Uzumaki clan would have to wade along on their own merits.

At least they had the beginnings of friends in high places.

As soon as possible after their arrival to the Hidden Leaf, Karin was officially enrolled in the Ninja Academy and, after a placement exam to determine her skills and knowledge, was placed in the year above Naruto with those her own age. The reveal of her clan name had caused something of a stir in the Academy, as everyone had assumed that Naruto and his new cousin were the last of their kind.

Over the next few weeks, the family was happy to find that Karin had begun making more of an impression for her personal skills. Upon her enrollment, Ken had insisted that Karin join him and Naruto for the blond's extracurricular training. Naruto had been thrilled to have a sibling student, and Karin had been enthusiastic to join. Upon putting her through the paces in learning the Uzumaki style of taijutsu, he was interested to find in her a natural instinct for evasion. Whereas Naruto naturally leaned toward attacking and only blocking where necessary, Karin dodged incoming attacks far more than she blocked. He also found out that she had a mean right hook, especially when angered.

Ken had found through other exercises that Karin's natural chakra control was excellent, and he determined through his mind's eye that her reserves would one day grow to be on par with his own and Naruto's — without the Fox's chakra, of course. This meant she caught up to and even surpassed Naruto in the Leaf Concentration exercise quite rapidly. While Naruto had pouted about it at first, he had then buckled down and refused to stay behind. Ken was happy to see this and resolved to introduce both of them to the next phase.

But most of all he was astounded at Karin's talent for the Mind's Eye of Kagura. There were clan stories, of course, of Uzumaki who had been skilled enough to merge the technique with the general Sensory Technique to expand their sight to incredible distances, and Karin was clearly one of them. To test her natural skill, Ken had conjured a crowd of shadow clones and asked Karin to find them, allowing them to disperse when she touched them. She had found all twelve and dispersed them within two hours, and only that long because she was still a child chasing what amounted to a group of adults in a village she was still unfamiliar with.

It was with all of this in mind that Ken brought the kids to a training ground with large trees and asked if they could climb this tree. Both of them raised their hands. "Can you climb it without using your hands or arms?" Ken asked, using the same phrase his grandfather had used years before. When neither of them spoke up, he began explaining the basics of the tree-walking exercise.

Within minutes, both of the children were running up their chosen trees with vigor. As predicted, Karin was getting a much better handle on it with her superior chakra control. It took her less than an hour to finally make it to the top of her tree, perching on the uppermost branch and swinging her legs as she stuck her tongue out at Naruto. Naturally, the blond couldn't let that pass and redoubled his efforts.

As Ken observed the kids continuing their exercise, with Karin being instructed to walk slowly up the tree trunk as opposed to getting a running start, he found a glass of lemonade being handed to him. Kaori offered a matronly smile that made Ken's heart ache for the mother he never knew, and he took the glass with a strained smile of his own.

"They seem to be having fun," Kaori noted, her tone pleased. She was dressed in a new style she'd adopted after they had settled, a thistle-purple sundress with an ash-gray apron embroidered with the Uzumaki clan crest, her hair tied back with a black ribbon that complimented her buckled black shoes.

"They are," Ken confirmed. "Granted, Naruto always has fun during training. I worry he may be some kind of addict, which would make me his enabler." He shrugged at the dark attempt at a joke. "I'm happy to see they have bonded so quickly, too."

"That would be all Naruto," Kaori said. "With his infectious enthusiasm and just … his charisma, Karin didn't stand a chance. And she tells me his chakra is warm and inviting, and my girl has always been sensitive to such things." She smiled, happy that her little girl had made such a strong friend after so many years. "Which reminds me, dear cousin," Kaori said with a faint smirk, "I believe it is time we elect a clan head."

Ken glanced at her with surprise. "Well, if you'll forgive me, you are the oldest of us."

"I'm only thirty, Ken," she scolded lightly. "I happen to be in the prime of my life."

Ken took a closer look and figured she looked about thirty … which might be a worrisome sign. The Hidden Whirlpool had been known as the "Village of Longevity" due to the Uzumaki clan's very slow aging, a perk of their powerful life forces. The fact that Kaori had aged to reflect her true years was a sign of overuse of the Rejuvenating Bite. He brushed that aside with the knowledge that she would not have to rely on it anymore. And he had to admit that she was still a striking woman.

"Besides which," Kaori continued, "I was not volunteering for the job. I was nominating you."

Ken flinched and his eyes widened in shock and a small amount of dread. "Why me?" he asked.

"Because you are the most powerful of us," she said, plainly and without a trace of bitterness. "You have led us these past weeks that we have been in the village together, you have brought in the income for the household, and you are the most educated in our ancestors' traditions." Granted, Ken had been sharing with her what he knew and the writings he possessed in his chained scroll, but the fact remained that he knew the most.

"I think I'd prefer a vote," Ken said dryly. "And that will leave us at an impasse."

"Not if we open the floor to all members of the clan," she replied. "Children! Come here for a moment!" When Naruto and Karin had approached them, Kaori leaned down to their level and asked, "Which of us do you think should lead our clan into the future? Me or Ken?"

"Cousin Ken!" Naruto shouted with glee.

"I also think Ken should lead us," Karin said, a twinkle of mischief behind her glasses. Her mother gave a wink and small smile as she stood up.

"Then it is decided," she surmised. She stepped back and gave a teasing bow. "Clan head Ken," she said.

Ken grumbled under his breath as he squeezed the bridge of his nose. "Well, if I'm the clan head, then get back to work you two," he said to the children. They giggled and ran back to their trees to keep up their training. "Let's just hope this doesn't lead to village politics," Ken murmured.

It had been just over a month since Karin and her mother had resettled in the Hidden Leaf, and she stood in a circle with the rest of her new-ish classmates for sparring. She carefully hid a smile as she tightened her fingers, the knuckles popping in anticipation. She fingered the hem of her new brown jacket that she wore over a maroon shirt displaying a navy Uzumaki crest and matching skirt, with black tights and buckled shoes, happy to have a new look upon moving to the Leaf.

Throughout her time in the Hidden Grass's Ninja Academy, she had never enjoyed sparring. Her fellow cadets had taken to tormenting her in the ring and her teachers made no effort to spare a foreigner. She'd dreaded those days, even after trying so hard to get better and perhaps have her fellows hesitate in the face of her prowess.

Now, though … Now she anticipated these sparring days. Karin had learned over her time in this village that there was a critical difference between self-teaching and actively being taught by an expert. And her new Cousin Ken had helped her along more in the last month than her previous instructors had in three years.

"Who will start us off?" their instructor, a gentle kunoichi who also wore glasses that were framed by long dark hair, called out.

"I'll go!" A husky girl stepped forward, her build and the markings on her cheeks indicating her Akimichi heritage. When asked who she would like to challenge, she pointed straight at Karin with a wide, honest smile. "Karin Uzumaki!"

Karin stepped forward and both girls formed the seal of confrontation before Karin took the stance she had slowly adopted during her training sessions with Ken and Naruto. The Akimichi girl took a stance more in-line with traditional Academy style and the instructor called to begin.

The girl yelled and charged with a barrage of heavy punches, which Karin danced away from and backflipped to get room. The girl came at her again and she dodged once before lashing out with a straight punch to her jaw, the blow connecting with a solid, meaty thump. The Akimichi reeled back and rubbed the spot before spitting and smiling. "Nice hit. But you can't bring down a mountain with one blow."

"So I'll just have to keep at it," Karin replied easily.

The spar continued much like that, with the Akimichi girl taking a powerful offensive and Karin evading her blows before striking out when she found an opening. After a full five minutes, the other girl looked a little worse for wear, whereas Karin was untouched and barely breathing hard. 'Uzumaki stamina,' she thought brightly. The girl charged again, but rather than evade Karin lunged as well. She ducked and spread her leg to trip her opponent, sending the Akimichi tumbling down. In a second, Karin was on top of her and had her arm in a joint lock.

"Karin wins!" the instructor called out. "Well done, ladies. Now, the seal of reconciliation." Both girls nodded as they formed the traditional seal and dissolved back into the small crowd while two more cadets volunteered.

"That was most impressive, Miss Uzumaki."

Karin looked over to find a boy with strange, almost circular eyes and short dark hair, dressed in a white short-sleeved kimono shirt tied with a dark cloth belt, dark pants, and boots. A cloth headband propped up his bangs, revealing a pair of very large eyebrows that honestly made her cringe a bit.

"Uh, thank you," she replied uneasily, remembering her mama's lessons to always be polite.

"You share your name with the warden of the Nine-Tails, yes?" the boy asked.

Karin narrowed her eyes and adjusted her glasses, opening her mind's eye with hardly a thought to examine the boy's chakra. "I am," she admitted as she examined him. She was surprised to find some strange abnormality within his chakra system, something she had never felt before. But she also felt no malice tainting it.

"If you would be so kind, I would ask you to extend my praises to the young Naruto," the boy said with a wide grin, very much like Naruto's own. "I imagine it must be a heavy burden jailing such a monster, and I wish him the best of luck in his duty."

Before Karin could reply, the current match ended and the teacher asked for more volunteers. The boy lifted his hand and shouted a challenge to one Neji Hyuga, who Karin recognized as being of the clan one of Naruto's friends was heir to. He bore the same white eyes … but he seemed cold and callous in comparison to little Hinata, who seemed like an absolute marshmallow.

The boys formed the seal of confrontation, as per the instructor's orders, and the spar began. This Neji fellow adopted a stance presumably from the Gentle Fist that Ken had once described, while the other boy, Rock Lee the instructor had called him, took on a stance she had never seen. The boys clashed … and Lee was struck down in two moves. Then he stood up, brushed himself off, and attacked in a different way … with identical results. This went on for several minutes before the instructor called the match and named Neji the winner.

Lee sighed and returned to the circle of cadets, clearly trying to mask his disappointment with stoicism. Karin asked the person next to her about him, and the boy gave a harsh laugh. "That's Rock Lee. He has zero talent for ninjutsu or genjutsu; something about his chakra being weird. He says he can graduate just on great taijutsu, but he's pretty average at that too. What an idiot."

Karin's eye twitched and, before she realized it, she had punched the rude boy into the ring. "Karin, would you mind explaining yourself?" the instructor said icily.

"I challenge this jerk to a match!" she shouted.

The match didn't last three minutes and ended with the rude boy being sent to the infirmary and Karin being reprimanded for excessive brutality. All the while, Rock Lee sniffled with joy at someone standing up for him.

Another few weeks passed before Ken made his first proposition as the new Uzumaki clan head.

"A family trip?" Karin asked.

"Oh yeah!" Naruto shouted. "Where're we going? Another village, the beach?" He gasped and clapped his hands to his cheeks. "Are we going to that Hot Spring village you told us about?!"

"No, no, and no," Ken said with a chuckle. "I'm not sure I'd call it a 'trip' so much as an excursion. We're actually not leaving the borders of the village." Naruto drooped in disappointment and Kaori asked what they would be doing.

"The Lord Third mentioned an abandoned Uzumaki shrine on the outskirts of the village," Ken explained, sealing supplies such as trail mix and weapons into small scrolls that he would then slip into a satchel. "I've been too busy to check it out since I got here, but I thought we might all check it out as a new family." He smiled a bit awkwardly, inwardly unsure if it was a good idea.

Kaori looked at Karin, who glanced at Naruto, who had stars in his eyes at the idea of exploring abandoned ruins. "I think we're all in," she surmised.

Two hours later found the four-person clan trodding through the forests just inside the village walls, Ken leading the way with an old map of the village and breaking a trail through the brush with his black wakizashi while Kaori held Karin and Naruto's hands. "If this map is accurate," Ken said distantly, gaze focused on the parchment, "the ruins should be right … about …"

"We're here!" Naruto cried, drawing Ken's attention up to a dilapidated wooden building.

"Steal my thunder, why don't you …?" Ken snarked to himself. "But there's no way that's not the place," he said louder and more enthusiastically. The central beam above the door was carved with the Uzumaki swirl, for crying out loud!

Ken held up a hand to keep the others from moving closer. "Let me make sure it's safe," he said. Without pause, he conjured a dozen staggered shadow clones that swarmed through the entrance. After several moments, he sighed as memories flooded his mind. "It's safe," he reported before leading the way.

The building, apparently some kind of temple, was a single large room with more wood for the walls. A podium stood at the back of the chamber, and a wooden wall was decorated with a number of masks styled after folkloric oni. A quick count numbered them at twenty-seven … a strange number.

Everyone started at Karin's sudden gasp, one of fear. She had her hands covering her mouth and was trembling. "Something's wrong …" she whispered, pointing to a mask modeled on images of the shinigami. "T-That mask is … Something is off about it."

Ken took the initiative and approached the podium and presenting wall, putting on some gloves before he removed the mask from its place. He turned it around and formed a strange hand seal, which caused miniscule writing on the interior of the mask to glow with faint blue light. Sealing formulae.

Ken's eyes widened as an impossible thought crossed his mind. He chuckled in disbelief and conjured another shadow clone. Without prompting, the clone took the mask and ran for the door, Ken following and gesturing for the others to do the same. As they all gathered in front of the shrine, Ken held out his arms to shield the rest from whatever may happen.

The shadow clone turned and faced them all as he slipped the mask on. A few moments passed before a massive aura of dark chakra enveloped the clone, the potency causing the clone to writhe in sudden discomfort. The area darkened, as if a stormcloud had passed over the sun, and a massive, semi-transparent shape emerged from behind the clone to hover above him.

The specter was massive, clothed in a voluminous, pristine white robe that matched its shaggy hair, while offsetting its dark purple skin and the red horns protruding from its head. A tanto was clasped in its mouth and a set of prayer beads were gripped in its left hand.

"Shinigami," Ken muttered, eyes wide with equal awe and fear. Kaori held the children close to her from behind Ken, all of their gazes filled with more fear than awe.

The shinigami hissed and pulled the tanto from its mouth with its right hand, revealing dark, jagged teeth. It cackled malevolently and struck down at the still-writhing shadow clone, cutting a deep incision from its shoulder to hip. The real Ken screeched in sudden pain and fell backward, curling in on himself as if he had been the one that was slashed. The clone burst into ethereal white flames and dispersed, leaving the shinigami to disappear and the mask to fall harmlessly to the ground.

Ken gasped a deep breath as the pain in his abdomen faded into an icy chill tracing the very path of the cut from his shadow clone. He was trembling as he struggled to his feet, breathing haggard. "I think I just saw my life flash before my eyes," he muttered in all seriousness. Dead seriousness, one might say.

"What was that?!" Kaori demanded.

Ken took up the mask and sealed it within a scroll. "That was the shinigami, the spirit of death," Ken explained. "My grandfather told me stories of an Uzumaki forbidden sealing technique that could summon the being and make a compact, to seal an enemy and the user within its belly. An instant-kill double-suicide technique." He held up the scroll containing the mask. "This mask was created as a failsafe for the technique. It supposedly allows the wearer to be possessed by the shinigami and cut open their belly to release those imprisoned within at the cost of their own life."

"Wow, that's creepy!" Naruto piped up, hiding his shaken nerves behind bravado and humor.

"I can't believe this mask was here this whole time," Ken said. "In your face, Grandfather!" he shouted to the sky. "I told you we should have come to the Hidden Leaf sooner!"

Ken sighed and rubbed the phantom wound across his torso, suddenly exhausted. "The shinigami usually takes the soul of the caster as payment for its summoning," Ken mused aloud. "It must have taken the shadow clone's chakra as a substitute."

"That's it, we're leaving," Kaori declared, tugging the children toward the forest by their wrists.

"Wait!" Ken cried out. "There may be more secrets inside!" He ran and imposed himself in front of Kaori. "The contents of that shrine are our rightful property," he said. "Our birthrights, in a way."

"And this birthright could be dangerous," Kaori argued heatedly. "The children are more important than lost artifacts."

"Just give me ten minutes," Ken pleaded. "I think most of those masks are decoys, but some might be real artifacts. Karin's use of the Mind's Eye is way more developed than mine, so she can figure out if there's anything in there."

Kaori's eyes widened in outrage, but before she could say anything, Karin tugged on her sleeve. "Mama, I wanna help. Please let me try?"

Kaori's anger melted away at the sight of her daughter's look of pleading determination. She wanted to help her new clansman. The mother sighed and fixed Ken with a withering look. "If she gets so much as a paper cut-!"

"I won't let that happen," Ken said, his tone as solid as bedrock. "You have my word, Kaori."

Kaori sighed through her nose and nodded, letting Karin go to follow Ken. She looked down at Naruto, who was staring wide-eyed after the confrontation. "Come along, Naruto," she said reluctantly. "If they're going to do something foolish, we might as well watch."

Naruto laughed as he ran to catch up to the others.

"Unbelievable," Ken whispered to himself.

Night had fallen on the Leaf village, and the children were in bed for the night. Ken and Kaori, on the other hand, were examining the set of nine masks they had recovered from the temple that were now spread in two rows on the kitchen table. Each of them was modeled on the appearance of an oni, just like the decoys. But all of them had changed to be colored upon being inspected by Ken's Uzumaki Seal Detection. Karin had been instrumental in taking the infused masks instead of the decoys, her mind's eye picking up on trace chakra within the sealing matrices.

The shinigami mask was at the far end of the table and would be sealed away before everyone went to sleep. But it was the other masks that had brought his exclamation. From right to left, the five masks in the upper row were themed in colors of fiery red, ash gray, pale yellow, dark green, and deep blue. Each of them also had their fanged mouths opened. The second row of three each had their mouths closed, and were themed light orange, forest green, and royal purple.

"What are these things?" Kaori asked.

"Lost legends," Ken replied. He glanced at each of the bedroom doors, Naruto bunking with him and Karin with her mother, before placing a sealing tag on the table. Sealing formulae spread out from it into a circle encompassing the table and the adults. "A privacy seal to prevent eavesdropping," he explained.

Little did they know that Naruto was cursing under his breath at the fact that he couldn't hear what the adults were saying, pouting as he returned to his bed.

"These are a collection of legendary Uzumaki artifacts lost to time," Ken explained. "They must have been relocated to Konoha for safekeeping and the location forgotten with the downfall of the Hidden Whirlpool." He gestured at the top row of five gaping masks.

"Those were known as the Masks of Conversion. Each of them was designed to store traditional chakra and manually convert it into one of the basic chakra elements before releasing it based on the will of the wearer. This would not only enhance any elemental ninjutsu used when wearing it, but would grant someone with no experience with that element limited use of it." He pointed at each of the masks. "Fire, Wind, Lightning, Earth, and Water Release."

Ken glanced at Kaori, who looked shell shocked from such information. "And those three down there were called the Masks of Consecration. They also store and alter traditional chakra, but not into elemental natures. The first moulds chakra into a sensory form and projects it in faint waves that the mask's matrices read to detect chakra signatures that become visible through the eyes. It's kind of like a bat's sonar for chakra signatures."

He pointed from the orange to the green mask. "This one moulds chakra into healing chakra. It can facilitate and enhance medical techniques." He gestured to the final one. "And that forms an aura of chakra around the wearer to shield them from physical or chakra-based attacks like a suit of armor."

Kaori held her hands in front of her mouth in shock. "How is this possible?" she asked.

"Uzumaki sealing arts," Ken supplied. "Some of the most talented and brilliant minds in the clan's history worked on these artifacts." He unfurled a scroll with nine separate seals and methodically sealed the masks away, the kanji for fire, wind, lightning, earth, water, sight, healing, protection, and death appearing in their centers.

"I'll need to report this to the Hokage in the morning," Ken said, rubbing his eyes. "I can't believe these were in Konoha all this time."

"Perhaps it's fate," Kaori groused.

"I know that was insincere," Ken replied dryly, "but I do wonder if you're right."

With that, the adults retired to bed as well, Ken securing the mask scroll with chains just as he did his larger Uzumaki clan scroll. But sleep was hard to come by as implications of this find swirled in his mind.

If destiny had conspired for them to find these masks now … what was to come that they might be needed?

Chapter twenty-nine, everyone! Hope it was as fun to read as to plan and write!

*For all those delightful Danzo-haters out there, I hope the explanation for no "official" punishment was sufficient.

*The additional Uzumaki masks were inspired by - but not copied from! - the fic "Whirlpools Among the Eddies," a Naruto/Karin fic that is very well-written and creatively world built. Certainly worth reading.

As always, leave a review if you liked it! And may your own projects be fun and fast to write!